School Starts

      Tomorrow school starts. For teachers anyway. Students start back on Wednesday. How do I feel about that? No regrets, for sure. Maybe I'll  miss the classroom, but not so far. When I think about what teachers put up with, being retired isn't a bad thing.

    I have heard of and witnessed more teachers leaving the profession than ever before in my nineteen years of teaching in my city. My district hired over 100 new teachers for this school year, a record in my experience. Administrators had to go outside the boundaries of the U.S. to fill vacancies. And they still have openings.  When I see all the negative press teachers are getting, it was a good time to retire.

    The most vocal group of detractors are parents. They aren't happy with what we teach or how we teach it. More and more at my school we dreamed up ways to teach basic skills to kids. In the past, parents taught these skills. How to use the library, shop for insurance, and even what to look for in buying a car--these are just a few things our teachers taught because students were floundering.

    When our younger son was a freshman, he got suspended for three days. He, along with four other boys, would hurry up and finish their lunch and head to the stairs. There two would try to climb the stairs while dodging the cups of water the other boys would be throwing from the top of the staircase. That earned them all a three-day suspension.

    Was the punishment harsh? I thought it a little extreme. Yet, despite the loud protestations from the boys that it wasn't fair, we stood with the school. We told our son that life wasn't always fair, but how he dealt with the unfairness could build his character. So for three days our son went to work with my husband and did his schoolwork and did extra chores around the house. His friends? They slept in late and took three days off of school. The parents disagreed with the punishment and backed their sons instead of the school.

    I saw this time and again as a teacher. Parents didn't have the energy or whatever to hold kids accountable. And the kids came out the losers.

     Through the years, I've seen parents abdicate their responsibilities because they are too tired or don't have time or don't want to be in that role. A majority of parents want to be friends with their kids; they shy away from holding kids accountable, even when it maybe wasn't the fairest situation. Simple, yet profound,  life lessons students used to learn from parents, are now going untaught or parents are looking to the school to teach those lessons.

    Parents don't have it easy. Their kids want boundaries and structure. They long for it. Those make them feel safe. Yet, at the same time, teenagers are learning independence and need to. It's a fine line for parents to tread in respecting the independence yet having structure. I've seen very few parents do this well.

    This school year brings with it a new cell phone policy to our district. Students will have to set their phone aside during class time. Cell phones were the bane of my profession. We had to constantly redirect students' attention so they would focus on school. Oftentimes they were receiving texts or phone calls from parents. Yes, phone calls. If I refused to let the student answer the phone, I would hear about it from the parent.

    The school year is starting, but it isn't for me. And I'm okay with that. Really, I am.