Teaching Is Hard Work

by SARAH CALDWELL

DEAR KAREN: The time is drawing near for your first day of teaching, the beginning of what I know to be a happy, interesting, and rewarding career. I do hope you will find it so — and for many years. Across the miles, I want to extend to you a hearty welcome as you come into a great profession. It gives me a warm inner glow to think of you now as one of us. I know you have the personality and the preparation that qualify you to undertake the challenge of teaching. We need a good many new teachers, it is true; but far more important is the fact that we need many new good teachers. I am confident that with persistence, patience, and willingness to give your best you are going to be a good teacher.

I have just finished ironing my best cottons — the “High Sunday” as Aunt Belle would call them — dresses that I don’t send to the laundry. Our fall weather is unpredictable. I want to be ready for Indian summer. Once classes begin, there won’t be much free time for things at home.

Each year in late August I find myself following the same pattern, every activity centered in the preparations for teaching again. Time hasn’t taken away any of my enthusiasm. I love to teach school! I certainly never thought seriously of choosing any other profession. Even when in the fourth grade, I was playing school with younger children during recess. Well do I remember tutoring your uncle Pat when he had to miss most of the first grade because of being sick — and how proud I was when he went back and was not required to repeat the year’s work! I guess that was really when I decided that I wanted to be a teacher. I’ve always been glad of that decision.

But with all the pleasure and satisfaction I derive from teaching, there are problems which are downright frustrating. I’m referring to the teaching load, the working conditions, the size of classes, the inadequate remuneration, the double shift, professional security, academic freedom, personnel practices, and community status.

With the great increase in today’s enrollment it is inevitable that you will be faced with the first three of these problems in some measure. I can only hope you’re fortunate enough not to be completely weighed down by them. They can produce tension, anxiety, and exhaustion to the point of taking the joy out of teaching if you try to meet them all head-on. Esc whatever devices you can to save wear and tear on the nervous system, especially in class when the varied demands of many pupils, the unexpected visitors, announcements, money collecting, disturb the quiet efficiency necessary for effective teaching. I’ve learned that these interruptions can best be cushioned with a sense of humor. To your routine teaching of several subjects may be added the extra tasks of lunchroom, study hall, or bus monitorial duty — you may not even have any free time to plan or relax during school hours.

Teaching is hard work and a steady pace. Frankly, my dear, it does not end with the dismissal of classes. School is never out for the good teacher. Planning lessons, grading papers, and faculty meetings invade the after-school hours, as do extracurricular activities such as clubs or plays. And of course, to keep up, you must continue your professional studies. If only you can view this overloading in proper perspective; if you can mix understanding with efficiency, and can somehow break the day and not your health, you will have made a good beginning in seeing the right side of teaching.

Even though I am not now faced with all of the problems I’ve listed, they are nevertheless very real to me and to every conscientious classroom teacher in the country. We realize that wherever one of these problems exists it is a serious handicap to teaching. We know that the ones who really suffer are the children and the communities they will grow up to serve.

Did you know that when I began, one of the deciding factors in my being elected to my first, position was my church membership? I was the applicant with necessary preparation who would make a balance on the faculty for the two leading denominations in the town. Right away I was asked to teach a Sunday School class—which I did and enjoyed. Having this responsibility meant that I stayed in town almost every weekend. These were not actually requirements — just things that were expected of a teacher.

I was never told of any rules or regulations concerning what teachers could or could not do. I was simply told to teach my class for the next nine months. There were no such things as a probationary period, tenure (I hadn’t even a written contract), a retirement system, or a salary schedule. One bargained individually for his salary. Mine was $720 for the year. To share a room with another teacher in a private home, where we also had our meals, cost more than half of that income. (And I should add, the landlady made many an effort to supervise our activities, even to suggesting a bedtime!) The year ended with your grandfather paying for my having had the privilege of teaching. I simply could not live for twelve months on the money i received — and remember there was no inflation or income tax deduction then.

I never thought of quitting, though. Instead, I began a program of summer study that June which was to last for the next four years. The inspiration to work for higher professional qualifications had been engendered by the example of Miss Zell Rozier.

Miss Zell, who was principal of the elementary school in Sparta where I first taught, belongs high on my list of Fnforgettable Characters. She was generally too busy with her own classes to give practical supervision, but always had time for conferences before and after school. She encouraged me to try out my new ideas and methods, and tactfully curbed my enthusiasm for any theoretical notion which, from her wisdom and experience, she knew would not be the best procedure. Never once was I afraid to talk with her about, anything that concerned my work, and I often sought her advice on personal matters. I had confidence in her judgment. I respected her counsel. I can truthfully say that working under Miss Zell’s leadership left little to be desired. All the teachers felt the same way about this fine, capable, and understanding person. She had no favorites.

There was no organized PTA in the school, but there definitely was an association between the parents and teachers. Those mothers and fathers were interested in the welfare of their children and in the program of their school. To them a teacher was a Very Important Person. This attitude permeated the thinking of their own households and generally those of their friends and neighbors who had no children in the classroom. Thus the townspeople were most cordial to the teachers. Their hospitality was warm and personal. We were invited to their homes for meals and parties. There were many pleasant drives, and I recall a couple of real excursions, when I went with families to the city for a play and we stayed overnight to shop on Saturday. These folks did things to make us feel we belonged in the community. We were invited to join their cultural, civic, and social clubs. Many friendships begun then have lasted through the years for me—friendships that I cherish.

It was this knowing and being known which made possible the many unscheduled, informal conversations I had with parents about their children. You see, I knew each one of the twenty-three students I taught as an individual, an individual in whose growth and development I was genuinely interested.

I remember the three Toms — the small immature one so interested in the store windows and visiting along the way that he never got to school on time until he was given the responsibility of watering our potted plants. It took a second year for him to be ready to learn to read, but his understanding parents were willing that he take the extra time to grow up. Once he became interested, he was a brilliant student. The handsome Tom was large for his age. He wanted to play with all the older boys. He learned quickly and was never satisfied with anything short of perfection. It was this desire that almost created a home-school problem when a perfect attendance record had to be broken because he had measles — that is, until the mother was convinced that other children shouldn’t “be exposed to a childish disease and get it over with early.” Then there was the short, chubbyfaced Tom who was a slow learner. He was the one who lived in the country and came to school on the bus. His mother got quite angry because he wasn’t allowed to bring his reader home. She wanted the older sister to “learn” the little fellow at night. She even wrote a note demanding that the book be sent home or else she would come in to meet me with a buggy whip! Fortunately a conference where the principal, the sister, and I talked over the reasons for keeping the book at school cleared up the misunderstanding. When the lady did come to school later for a Mothers’ Day program there was no whip — nor any mention of the incident.

In those years I had the time to give personal attention to all the children, trying to meet their varying needs. There was also time to evaluate each one’s total progress, but the formal record sent home on a traditional report card could not tell the story adequately. I was glad of the opportunities to report in person. This gave me the chance to learn about the children’s out-of-school life, too. As a result of these contacts the parents and I worked together in a natural sort of partnership to help their children do their best. We were both agreed that getting an education came first in a child’s life; consequently there was no competition of part-time jobs for school hours. Because of this wholehearted home cooperation, the discipline problems were minor, and truancy cases and juvenile delinquents nonexistent in Sparta.

In the thirty years since I started to teach, I’ve certainly known many changes — changes for better, for worse. When I came to Akron I was able to select comfortable quarters where I could live independently and within my budget and enjoy a pleasant home life.

Life in a large city presents complications not known in a small town, however. My school is only one in a system. I belong to a faculty within a faculty, to a community of many parts. It is a complex society where almost everyone’s life and work follow a definite routine. There is little time or opportunity to establish social contacts with parents. Conferences must be planned in advance. Telephone conversations must often replace informal, personal visits between teachers and parents. PTA meetings are held during schooltime or at night. The remarkable thing is that in spite of these circumstances a fine coöperation is maintained between the majority of the homes and the school in their district.

I’ve always had a written contract here. At first it was yearly. Now, by law, it is continuing. Teachers throughout the state, having satisfactorily completed a probationary period, are protected from dismissal, except for justifiable cause — and even then they have the right to a legal hearing. There is a sound retirement system for teachers of the slate, one that has been continuously improved; now it includes some benefits for dependents. State laws provide for an accumulated 90 days of sick leave (1¼ days per month of service) without loss of salary, and a minimum salary schedule for all full-time teachers, regardless of grade or subjects taught, who have equal preparation and experience. Another law makes it permissible for a local board of education to pay a teacher’s expenses and salary while having visiting days or attending professional meetings. (I want to pay genuine tribute to my current superintendent and board of education for their willingness to observe this law. I could never have had the privileges of growth and enrichment experienced while serving as an official ol the National Education Association had they not granted me a professional leave of absence, on two occasions, without loss of pay.)

If I stopped here you might conclude that I am now teaching in the State of Utopia! Not quite. These legal professional advantages and securities are good and vitally necessary — of this I am fully aware — but not all are as sufficient and ideal as one might judge.

You see, I have known the struggles of teaching in the days when we had only very limited sick leave and when there were great differences between the salaries of teachers in elementary and high schools, regardless of qualifications. I can remember drastic salary cuts, using script for currency, borrowing money to live. 1 have known days filled with more than these causes of anxiety: they were days filled with fears, first of being denied the right to full professional status, along with several hundred other married women on the staff, and then of personal reprisals because of my activities in the local classroom teachers’ association.

Neither of these latter fears became realities, because an able administrator, one having vision and leadership, with the support of professional colleagues was able to avert these crises— both of which could have happened quite within the legal provisions of the time.

I recall those incidents with no feeling of personal animosity. Indeed, I felt none at the time. It was understood that the person responsible for the dilemma was really a sick man, unable to think clearly in dealing with the pressures of misdirected public sentiment or about the importance of democratic teacher participation in organization work. I simply draw on my experience to illustrate why I have come to have such a deep appreciation of the importance of sound school-legislation that provides security for teachers.

Such laws are not easy to enact. None in our state was handed down on a silver platter by the governing bodies. It took long years of hard work on the part of the organized teaching profession and of laymen interested in the schools to achieve their passage, and the program is not yet complete.

The retirement system, for instance, is not wholly adequate, in terms of today’s inflated dollar, to meet the needs of old age. This is particularly true for leachers who retired several years ago. Our state education association has set up a special fund to help some who find themselves in dire circumstances. The new income tax provision to increase personal exemption to $1200 for all retired persons is of substantial financial value to these former teachers.

Although the school board in our city abolished several years ago the policy of not employing married women teachers (establishing a two-year maternity leave at the same time), there are still places in the state where such a policy is in force; thus a woman teacher who marries is considered to have automatically terminated her teaching contract. In my opinion this (and all other forms of discrimination in employment of qualified teachers) is an unwise use of local authority. There are weak spots in our tenure law. (A compromise on the wording of the original bill was necessary in order to get it passed.) As a result, after thirteen years only about half of the teachers in the state actually have the full security which the law provides. There are still far too many dismissals near the end of the five-year probationary period. Such a constant turnover of teacher personnel is false economy and detrimental to any school system. Ways must be found to bring about cooperative thinking between the profession and the public on this problem.

The law on salaries is just what its name indicates, minimum! The $2500 it guarantees is not much of an inducement to one who has spent sixteen years in preparation for the job. It is difficult to talk to young folk about the joys and satisfactions to be derived from teaching when they look realistically at the financial side of the lodger. They know about the costs of living. They look not just at the beginning salary but at the possible maximum. That is when some of them really decide against teaching as a life profession. In communities where emphasis has been put on an adequate starting salary as an inducement to attract good teachers, they recognize that teaching compares favorably with other occupations. But there is little assurance that one will ever be able so much as to double the amount earned in the first year.

The inability to achieve a good top-bracket salary is one of the reasons why every year nearly one tenth of the total number of t eachers in the country leave the profession. Some of those who leave have used the first few years of employment as a steppingstone, never intending to follow teaching as a career. Others, like the man ,on a bus in Idaho, discover they can’t afford to teach.

Another tone her and I were riding along together, deep in conversation about our children and schools, when we suddenly realized that the man across the aisle had moved into a vacant seat in front of us. He was making no effort to conceal the fact that he was listening to what we were saying. In a few minutes he politely introduced himself, presenting his card, which identified him as an engineer with a large corporation. He then went on to say, “I apologize it I seem rude, but I’m interested in your conversation. I used to teach school. I first graduated from engineering college. Later I went back to study four years in a teacher-training institution, because I realized that what I really wanted to do was teach children. I had nine happy years in the classroom. But somehow eating got to be a habit with me and my family, so here I am — back in business.”

This is no isolated testimony. The same thing is happening to thousands of qualified teachers all over the nation. It will continue to happen until the salaries of teachers are substantially raised so as to be in proper relation to purchasing power of the dollar and to salaries in other professions.

I hadn’t intended to write a dissertation on salaries, but nation-wide this is still the number one problem. Our schedule has been greatly improved in the last few years. Another upward revision will go into effect this fall. This puts us in line to move forward with the other city systems in the stale. Even in this more favorable financial position I can’t shut my eyes to the known facts: salaries directly affect the manpower supply in teaching, and there aren’t, enough qualified teachers at work in the classrooms. If the existing concept of adequate salaries for teachers is not soon changed in some communities, the boards of education are certain to find themselves forced to employ anyone willing to “keep school —if their schools are to be kept!

Truthfully, that phrase “keeping school” has a frustrating connotation for me. Often I feel that is really all I am doing. Of course you realize that ever since I was asked to transfer from elementary school to high school I’ve had to meet far more students each day. Last year was just about average. I had 182 in my six classes and 33 in the home room. I managed to learn which names and faces belonged together, even to recognize everyone outside of class; but honestly, it was the smart ones and the slow ones I knew best — plus any discipline eases, which always must have attention so as not to disrupt the work of the others. If it were humanly possible to give each student the individual help he needs and deserves — which it isn’t in a 41-minute period — I’m convinced there wouldn’t be too many class disruptions!

May be I am an idealist, but I don’t believe there is really a youngster who is bad at heart; at least I’ve never taught one. There are a great many with problems who need understanding and guidance. They also not’d to have someone with time and patience who can just listen to them talk, too. Parents, ministers, scout leaders, counselors, coaches, and teachers all have a role to play in helping adolescents to grow up. I seldom was able to do my part except in hit-or-miss fashion. There was little opportunity on the schedule to meet students in private conference, and we had no adequate place to talk when there was time. Our large student body required that practically every room be in constant use during the day. Many students were employed alter school or had responsibilities at home while their parents worked. We sometimes got together before eight-fifteen, when school started in the morning.

I have always gone early to school in order that I might have at least a half hour in my room when it was not occupied. This habit was established eighteen years ago when the building first began to look like a Herblock cartoon, “bursting at the seams.” On double-session days my first class was at seven-thirty!

We had two faculties in the building then —overlapping between 10.30 A.M. and 2.30 P.M., when all in the first faculty went home. That was teaching on a production line, for the students came in shifts, too. Some of us were always coming or going in the dark during winter. With a school day of only four and one-half hours many students had full-time working jobs during the war years, especially the upperclassmen. (It was not unusual for the older boys to get more pay than I was getting.) The result was that school became a part-time occupation for too many students. Some of those big boys, having worked all night in the factory, were so tired they would go to sleep in class.

Of all the things I’ve written about, the one that directly concerns me most as an individual is being asked to do more than I can get done to my own satisfaction and the students’ advantage. I have the freedom to teach. Our schools have been spared the unwarranted attacks known in some parts of the country. There is no lock-step method imposed by the course of study. There is just too much to do! All of our teachers face this problem. I should like to think the situation will be improved this fall. The prospects are not bright. New schools are opening in the city, but the number of new rooms and new teachers does not keep pace with the ever-increasing enrollment.

I am going to be in one of the new schools. Of course I shall miss the students and faculty where I have been for twenty-three years. Roots go down deep in that time. I was teaching my second generation there.

I’m wondering about Don, that chub by-faced chap with an IQ of 150. Can he hold up his own standards of scholarship and still command respect as “a regular guy”? He will need encouragement to keep his values straight if he’s teased about being “a brain,” for he is only fifteen.

And Bob—will he have matured enough to understand that his rebellion against women teachers was unconsciously rooted in his home, where he was surrounded with women and had no father?

Will Maureen keep on her diet? She looked and acted like a different girl after losing those 35 pounds.

What has Pat been doing since she dropped out of school? Will she be back? She was a bright girl who matured very early. I hope she finds herself before it is too late.

How will Ruthie be able to do in the three subjects she didn’t pass? She wasn’t quite ready for our high school with its routine of no supervised study and floundered from the beginning.

And there are many others. Maybe I shall see some of them during the year.

I am not leaving the community, just moving into another section with the Junior High School. The change will have many advantages and offers stimulating challenges. I have never taught in a brand-new building. This one is lovely, a modern laboratory for learning designed in keeping with the findings of scientific research. The selection of teaching equipment was as exciting as buying furnishings for a new home. All my personal files and room reference books are in place. I wanted to have everything ready tor the students’ arrival. It will be a strange environment for them. Just like the faculty, they will come from many buildings. We shall be pioneers together in a new place with a new program. It will mean a transfer of loyalties. There must be a “welding together” of students and teachers to make our school the best school, a goal that will require extra hours, hard work, and genuine desire to accomplish. I look forward to my part in the experiment.

I want to tell you, though, there will be butterflies in my stomach when I face the new classes — just the same as you will have. Years of experience don’t eliminate that kind of fear. Teaching is such a big job and the opportunities are so vast—even with the problems that I have been writing about — a teacher who measures herself against such a responsibility always wonders, “Can I do it? Can I do it well?” There is comfort in a remark attributed to Mr. Coolidge: “We cant do everything at once, but we can do something at once.” I shall try to follow that sound advice again this year.

The best part of teaching is the pupil personnel — boys and girls with a wide variety of abilities and needs. They all offer a great challenge and I love to teach them! I hope you will love teaching too — always,

AUNT SARAH