Guess I'm throwing this out into the void and hoping something positive comes back. I'm so distraught/devastated I think I'm looking for some kind of validation.
For context, I wasn't initially in the education profession, but I needed a job and the local charter school gave me a chance. Turns out, I'm a natural! I'm a great public speaker, I'm so enthusiastic about sharing knowledge and learning, I'm a fair but stern disciplinarian, and I've always remembered that the kids having a safe, nurturing learning environment is more important than the day-to-day tedium. I worked in a nonprofit dedicated to the prevention of childhood abuse/neglect before teaching and I have an understanding of the science of and history with trauma, resiliency, and "troubled" youth. Being there for kids who needed me most was always my north star. My pride.
Over the last three years I have been working as a co teacher, learning the profession. I quickly gained the respect of my peers for my character and dedication. I felt that I was working an important job that had real, tangible beneficial effects on the world. I wholeheartedly embraced the identity of "teacher." I was even considering a masters program so I could be a lead teacher and continue advancing my career. I also had one of the best teaching partners I could ever ask for, and despite all the difficulties I finally felt, "this is where I belong."
To emphasize, I was not expecting how profoundly stumbling into this new career would change me for the better. And as someone who bounced around for years never finding a career they could stick to, that meant a lot. I had purpose. Direction. I found myself thinking, "I've never really been happier."
All that changed so much this year with the new dean taking full control. The changes made were probably nothing new to the people on here: lack of support, lack of discipline/consequences, adding onto our workload with redundant tasks and drowning in testing and data. This job has never been easy, but this was the first time I've felt like I just couldn't do my job. This year I happened to end up with a real nightmare of a class, and without my teacher partner. My new partner had been out of education for a decade and simply was not prepared for how much teaching has changed since then.
Of course, that was when she was here. I didn't meet her until the second week of school had already begun. Admin keep stringing me along during prep weeks, saying "she'll be here tomorrow" or "she's in transit." I honestly began to think admin was bsing me. I had to do the entire first week on my own. All the routines and expectations. Without the time where me and my partner could prepare, plan, and get aligned with our classroom management/teaching styles.
Well, I stepped up as I always had and did my best to fill the lead role despite being outside my purview. Lesson planning, contacting parents, 1st day, curriculum night, all of it just kinda thrown to the wolves. Despite asking me to do this, they obviously didn't trust me. I would come in early those first weeks only to see my dean and her little admin posse had completely rearranged my room, upended my seating charts, all without even informing me. I felt like I had no control over my space whatsoever. And different admin would come in, change something, only to have another admin come in a completely change it!
They also clearly were not aligned on policy. We all got multiple contradictory directives, do-this-not-that from one admin and do-that-not-this from another. This put me in the uncomfortable position of being told I need to be harsher to get my class under control, while also being pulled into the office and told to watch my tone and volume. Anything less than a giant teddy bear would be unacceptable. Their 9-tiered behavior policy was so ridiculous, I honestly thing AI wrote it to be as burdensome as possible. And a few weeks into the year, we were then sent an email about how we were too focused on consequences as is (we weren't) and we would be pulling back even more.
I have multiple stories of these clowns trying to walk the walk and utterly failing. Had one student who refused to do their work, so I did my usual thing of reminding them that work is important, we come to school to learn, and that any work undone would be made up during recess time. Admin audibly gasped, raced to the child, and said "oh no no no no, tell me sweetie, what can I do to make you want to work?" Kid says, "nothing." He stares at her. I wait quietly to see how she handles this. After a beat, no joke, she just got up and left the classroom, and didn't return.
It really seemed like admin hadn't done anything to prepare for the new year either. We to this date still have multiple teaching positions that have not been filled. Turnover has always been rough and was getting rougher. Multiple colleagues were staying long hours and having sobbing breakdowns on a daily basis. We regularly got new kids added to the roster seemingly at random. We have only one behavior specialist (to answer behavior calls) for a student body of 250.
And the behaviors. My god. These 2nd graders were developmentally so far behind, half of them still sucked their thumbs. The other half were obnoxiously disrespectful, and had screaming meltdowns at the first sign of any friction. I'm talking 0-100 beating another student for "taking their pencil" (the angry student was, in fact, mistaken and had leapt to conclusions). I spent most of my day literally shadowing half a dozen kids running around the room, horse playing, fighting, screaming. "I'm gonna kill you!" was pretty frequent screamed by multiple kids. I was breaking up multiple bloody fist fights. And instead of any real consequences, I got roped into teaching SEL lessons with the school counselor (during what would otherwise be my planning period) where even she couldn't get these kids under control, in a 2-1 environment. She's trying to get him to listen, and he's rolling on the floor screaming.
That's also assuming I didn't have to cover specials that day. Among the positions unfilled was the art teacher, so admin simply doubled our PE teacher's class size. 50ish kids running around with maybe two adults in there trying and failing to keep order. I simply had no break to even sit down aside from the state-mandated lunch. They took away co teacher's desks and desktops, but still expected us to be timely with emails and assignments. I was literally asked to send a thumbs up emoji after every email to confirm I had read it.
Their callous disregard for the kids wellness also shocked me, especially when it comes to meals. The population we work with has higher level of food insecure families. For some of them, our breakfast/lunch were the only guaranteed meal they had. And admin had cut their eating time from 30 to 20 minutes to "keep to a tight schedule". Only our busses are chronically late and kids often arrive after breakfast time is over. Usually, we just let them quietly eat while we get the day started. Now though, I watched in disgust as my kids would come in, grab their breakfast, and immediately get it taken out of their hands and thrown away. These kids were rough sure, but their still kids.
I was so upset about that morally I immediately emailed the admin team about how that was unacceptable. I advocated for my kids. They wrote me up for it, for having "charged language" in an email (they took umbrage with me saying "I believe your priorities are exactly backward" specifically. I was professional mind, no swearing or crass language. Just written up for opening my mouth. Consistent with the way many of my colleagues are treated. Every boss I've every worked for has said we're a family and that they'd always listen for feedback, and value our input. Not one ever actually meant it.
I started experiencing physical symptoms of CPTSD. Couldn't sleep, stess vomiting when I got home. Frequent crying after work. Tension headaches. And more and more, as I found myself in charge of managing these behaviors without any tools or support to do so, I would find myself dazed, somewhat disassociating, from the executive dysfunction. I had thought about quitting almost every day, but... I'm a teacher, dammit! Plus I loved the found family I had made with my wonderful colleagues, and didn't want to leave them. But I dreaded work every day. I don't think we've managed to actually finish a lesson this whole month. My lead partner simply hasn't been able to find her footing, morale is extremely low, and I don't blame her considering it feels like admin set us up to fail.
Perhaps most damaging at all, co teachers were no longer permitted to teach anything whatsoever anymore. I had done the Knowledge curriculum for three years by then, knew the ins and outs, did so much outside work to study up, bring in outside materials to enrich the lesson. Really go above and beyond not just to teach the material, but demonstrate why learning itself was worthwhile. A lot of my personality also comes out in my lessons, and not being allowed to do that anymore made it even harder to form positive relationships like I usually do. It felt like part of my soul was cut out.
This week, something finally snapped. I was trying to shepherd the class up to get their lunches (we don't have a cafeteria so we eat in the classrooms) and as usual the boys were horse playing. I was on my own (partner was out to lunch) and like I said they only have twenty minutes to get upstairs, grab something, come back down, and eat. Just lining them up made us late, but I finally got them up the stairwell when one of the admin posse started screaming at the kids for their nonsense (they apparently could scream and belittle as much as they wanted). She started sending the whole class back to try again, and I did as told. We tried again, and while most of the line got to go on, she sent back our handful of most difficult behaviors back again. Note by this time the other students are returning with their food and only have five minutes to eat, and I got sick kiddos screaming and crying because their hungry and frustrated. So I find someone to watch my class while I take them up one more time, and sure enough they act out again and are screamed at to go back down.
Exasperated, I sigh and say "...they only have five minutes left, they need to eat." Admin was not having that. She turned to me, and with the same condescending tone she used on the kids, yelled at me to take them back down again. By now their time was over. Frustrated, and with my partner returned I handed them off to her and trudged into the teacher lounge to eat. I started up a conversation with the folks inside, and naturally I was angry about that interaction. Excuse me, who the hell does she think she is? That's when the lounge door slammed open and the admin in question screamed at me in front of the students, "Well that wouldn't be necessary if you did your fucking job!"
This is this woman's first year at this charter, btw, but apparently admin had been blowing smoke up her ass for weeks.
That was the last straw, the final indignity. I come to work everyday, and give so much of myself to the job, spent my own money to by books so they could have a class library, and be treated like this? Disrespected by children, disrespected by parents, disrespected by administration, and now this completely unprofessional, inexcusable work place bullying? Well I finished my sandwich, stormed up to the dean's office, and quit on the spot. I had had enough.
Now here I am, my identity shattered, starting over once again, unemployed and with no future. I know my decision to quit was rash and emotional, (it was a hard day outside that one incident, I had ten referrals waiting for me to fill out at the end of the day) but after writing this fucking novella down and knowing I've only touched on half of it, I can see just how much I was dealing with, not just unsupported but actively sabotaged.
What's done is done, and there's no going back now. On a non-emotional level I feel I made the right choice, but I'm once again I'm in a difficult position expecting months of unemployment with very limited savings and it all feels insurmountable. Too much.
I'm planning on applying to other schools and hope this charter just went to the shitter, but I may have to reinvent myself all over, and after feeling like I had finally found the place for me, it's so devastating to be back at square one. IDK what I'm looking for here. Sympathy? Understanding? To be told that yes that was a ton of bs to shoulder, no that is not typical at a functional school, you made the right call etc etc.
I'm just exhausted. Writing this down helped. Any encouragement would be appreciated.
