Teachers quit and that’s okay. To those who are in the midst of thinking to quit… You’re not alone. I am officially admitting that I want to give up too. If last year I was all adamant that I want to do this forever, I would be lying if I said I am still the same person today. Having been in school for almost two years now, the fight is only getting harder and lonelier. I have met enough teachers who are counting down the seconds to the last bell of school and the last day of their teaching career to be demotivated. I have read enough about other job prospects and given enough offers to consider going back to corporate life. There are days when all I feel is anger or sadness. Just one emotion or the other and it’s making me a horrible person to have around. I’m in a school where the best guest speakers leave earlier than scheduled because they can’t stand the hyper-activeness of our kids. I could go on for days on everything that needs fixing in our school including the fans that have stopped working for weeks in all the classrooms on the second floor. I could write an endless list of why quitting makes more sense than staying. I could tell myself that I should pursue something less tiring and frustrating. That I’ll make enough money to come back and contribute in a different way. I have however forgotten the feeling of bliss from being ignorant. I have been on the ground long enough to learn that it’s not the money that would turn things around. It’s the kind of people who stayed on. So even though quitting appears in the mind more often than usual in the last few months, they don’t linger for long. To those who are in the midst of thinking to quit and is planning to proceed, I wish you all the best in whatever you wish to pursue in the future. However, on behalf of all those who are staying on, I have a request that I hope you would consider. If you do quit, leave with encouragements. Don’t tell those who want to stay, that all this is not worth a fight because that thought is even more depressing than the thought of good people like you leaving. Please tell us that we should keep at it. Because we know how you feel and God knows we have felt it too, only we decided to keep going when you decide you have had enough. We understand why you don’t want to go through this anymore. We understand that there are other things in life to live for. There is no need to justify. You did not go through anything worse nor are you more tired than those who want to stay. We also acknowledge that we do not deserve anything more for wanting to stay. Neither one of us is a failure nor crazier than the other. Only our decisions differ. That is why I hope when you do leave, you wouldn’t scream independence, at least not to our faces, because let’s be honest, there was never a chain that made you stay as long as you did. It’s just that, it’s almost insulting to insinuate that all who are staying are staying on because we have no other options. If anything, help us save that last spark for teaching which you and I both know that without intervention, is inevitably dying. If one day I do end up quitting, please don’t congratulate me and exclaim, “Finally! You’ve come to your senses!” There is nothing to be celebrated about when one decides that building a nation through education is a hopeless effort. Do not console me either, because life is a set of options, and not being able to continue anymore isn’t a sign of failure. I only hope that you would simply encourage me to do better in my next journey. Teachers quit and it’s okay. But despite how tough things could be, not all of us do and that’s okay too.
Posted on: Thu, 04 Sep 2014 13:26:22 +0000
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