How many educators are actually content with the United States Department of Education? How many go home after a long day and praise the people who ask for more work hours than they are willing to pay? I can say, without even being a certified teacher yet, that I would not be someone doing either of those things.
The reason behind typing this post is in the form of tears that welled in my eyes over the confusion and frustration caused by attempting to file paperwork for subbing. What I assumed would be a simple matter of getting fingerprints taken and filling out an application to be given to the district I want to sub in is anything but. Before I am able to sub for my mentor teacher, I have to send my paperwork to the State and await approval, which could take up to 2 weeks. Then, I am supposed to meet with someone that I do not know who is to finalize my paperwork and give written approval for me to sub. Had I known any of this, I would have begun the process weeks ago. Of course, I want to blame the certification program at my school and get angry at them for not knowing all of this and putting it in the handbook, but I feel like that wouldn’t do me any good. I like the supervisors I have through the program. Maybe they didn’t know that the process had become so complicated. Perhaps I should have done this weeks ago anyway and avoided the negative feelings I have now. Despite anything I could have done to avoid this anger, though, I believe I would have still come up with something to be mad at the system about.
As much as I am enjoying my student teaching experience, I can’t help but get irked over thinking about how many rules and regulations there are to follow in order to teach in a public school. It bothers me that teachers I work with, teachers I’ve come to realize actually care very much about educating young people, could be bogged down by the system at any moment. There are so many restrictions, which may depend upon location, and all I can think about is how much I would love to just teach these same students in a completely different way.
Today, I sat in on some Parent/Teacher Conferences, and I was saddened by the predicament of one girl. She is becoming bored in her math class, and her mom is concerned that she is not able to move into a higher level. While I could understand the reasoning behind the class dwelling on topics she may already know in order to get them to stick with her, I wondered what her personal expectations of school are. Does she expect teachers to be able to accommodate her individual needs, to help her succeed and move on to high school and college? Does she expect there to be consequences if she is going through school without learning anything new? Does she feel like the system is failing her? Because that’s how I felt in those moments, listening to the teachers speak and watching her expression stay neutral.
While this post is purely a rant in order to vent my feelings, I do wonder, every day now, how we could make a difference. What can we do as educators to help students as much as possible without having to seek some kind of approval? Can’t we just ask them what they want to learn, how they want to learn it, and take it from there? I wish it were that simple. And despite these frustrations I have, or perhaps because of them, I am still anxious to be a teacher. I want to have a hand in educating young people about science. As long as I remember that, I can get better at standing against the system.
athoughtfulmind 