A Letter to a Would-Be Teacher from a Veteran Teacher

Do not become a teacher. It’s not too late for you. If you’re in high school and dream of being that supportive guiding educator who’ll make a difference, know that you won’t. If you’re in college and have signed an education major, change it. If you’re registered for your student teaching, drop it while you can still get a refund. I’m invested. I bet tens of thousands of student loan dollars on being a teacher. I moved thousands of miles away from my family and friends for my teaching position. And I am the villain in the drama that is the American educational system. If you enter this profession, you will become the villain, too.

There are a wide variety of occupations you will doubtlessly find more rewarding. Your students won’t want to learn, their parents won’t care until they’re failing your class, and then only a few. Those few will demand to know why you’ve not done your job, why you didn’t find some way to get through to their children. It will not occur to them that they’d bequeathed their apathy to their children. It will not occur to them that they are the single most important factor to their children’s success. They reject any responsibility for children’s success. It is your responsibility and yours alone.

But it’s not only parents who will make you regret your decision, make you feel the fool in the years to come should you enter this profession. The politicians will tell you what you want to hear until they’re in office, but there are far more parents than teachers and the politicians will not hesitate to show you how expendable you are. In politics, fixing a problem is peripheral to finding the least powerful party to blame for it. Don’t believe me? Just watch the news and you’ll see how fast politicians from our current president all the way down to state legislators have sold us out. When they say the time for finger pointing is at an end, that means they’ve already decided who to blame, and for the problems of America’s educational system, that’s teachers. As with the parents, it won’t occur to the politicians and pundits that parents aren’t being held accountable, and it won’t occur to them that the greater society that refuses to provide much of our youth with adequate safety, nutrition, and health care isn’t being held accountable. No, it’s only we teachers who need to be held accountable.

If you would become a teacher, instead become an accountant, or a mathematician, or a plumber, or an electrician. You won’t be accused of being the root any major social problem, and you’ll be better able to pay your bills. You won’t have trouble sleeping at night because you’re frustrated by a system rendered intentionally dense by virtue of its political nature. You’ll get to solve problems, not be pressured to adhere to the latest educational gimmick designed to give the semblance of problem-solving. You probably won’t have to waste hours of your time each week on an ever-increasing avalanche of pointless paperwork, and then get blamed for having less time to actually do your job. No, stay out of teaching.

Teaching isn’t the worst gig in the world right now, despite being society’s scapegoat for all of its educational woes. I make a decent living. Most teachers who have a master’s degree and a few years under their belts make a decent living. You, however, need to think about the future. The Republicans have always been the enemies of teachers, and now the Democrats have decided to sacrifice us to political expediency. The president wants standardized test results used to evaluate teachers. How can the test results be used to evaluate teacher performance when the skills required to pass those tests are acquired over many years, from many different teachers, and often from several different school districts? It’s coming, and you will have to contend with it as tomorrow’s teacher. The president also wants school districts to expand charter school programs, despite their mediocre performance (most have test results and graduation rates comparable to or below the regular public schools in their districts, and that despite the charter schools’ ability to pick and choose their students). But charter schools are seen as hotbeds of innovation, while regular public schools, thanks to the domination of nefarious teachers’ unions, are stifled and mired. That freedom to innovate, of course, comes via their ability to pay non-union salaries and require their teachers to work non-union hours, which accounts for why teachers leave charter schools even faster than they leave regular public schools, and why that magical cure for society’s educational woes has yet to be found. But charter schools do help districts circumnavigate the unions and undermine our ability to collectively bargain. Increased federal funding for charter schools and increased pressure on school districts to expand charters schools is the reality. In the near future, you will have either a charter school position—with its longer hours, lower pay, and lower job security—to look forward to, or you will get a position with a regular public school where ever eroding pay, benefits, and professional autonomy await you.

In this game, I and teachers like me went all in. We’re obliged to stick it out, to fight the losing battle until its bitter end. Some of us will make it to retirement, most will be forced to walk away from their investments and start over from scratch in some other occupation. There’s no good reason for you to become a teacher. The things you dream of accomplishing will come to not. Forces are arrayed against you, and if you enter the profession, they will thwart your efforts. Indeed, society itself will oppose your efforts while blaming you for educations lack of progress. As a teacher, you will be made cynical, your idealism will dry up, and you will struggle against a constant bitterness. If you still have the choice, if you can stay in college a little longer, become something else, something that will pay you well and let you sleep peacefully at night. Do not become a teacher.