If you want to see pure exhaustion, find a teacher who has just finished a long school year. It does not matter the level that they teach, this is the moment in their busy schedule where they have plowed through the final assessments, attended all of those important milestones in their students’ lives such as graduation or promotion, and have tidied up their classrooms enough so it will look like they care about the way outsiders perceive them. The end of the year is a mad dash at the end of a long marathon, and it takes the last remnants of energy that any educator has left in their tanks. I know that when I make my way out of campus for that final time of the school year, carrying my milk crate full of my personal effects, I feel completely spent like I want to flop down on a couch looking to run the laps on television with the remote in my hand. It is about all my mind can handle at this time, but I know in my heart that it will not last for very long.
After all, it is summertime! This time of the year that I find my own choices to do with as I will, and the television will just not satisfy my craving for adventure, and intellectual stimulation. There are so many books I want to read, so many games I want to play, and so many places I want to see that I cannot let that pure exhaustion plant me in my living room. I have to get out, and see what the world has to offer. This means that I look deep within myself to find that reserve I know is down there.
Every teacher has this reserve. They pull from it constantly. It usually comes at the beginning of the day, during a hurried lunch, or right after the final bell when a troubled student stumbles into their room to look for some kind of guidance. This could be anything from help with their writing to advice about relationships to just a friendly face that they need at that exact moment. It is part of the teacher’s job to put aside what they are doing, and all of their worries and concerns, to take care of the needs of their student. And people tend to forget that it is not just one student. The stream of students can sometimes feel like it is ongoing, and at the end of the year that stream really starts to surge. Add on to this, all of the little things a teacher needs to do at the end of the year: create and grade exams, calculate final grades, and tie up any loose ends, and you have the perfect storm where that reserve well will quickly run dry.
The management of a classroom is another thing that most people do not consider when talking about the drain on teachers. I recently had a talk with a friend of mine who works outside of academia about this. He is a manager of a group of twelve people and he was telling me how exhausting it could be to make sure that all of these people are getting the work done that needs to get done. I had to chuckle a little bit because managing twelve people sounds like heaven. He did not consider that a high school teacher has at least five classrooms of people that they have to manage. I am one of the lucky ones that work internationally, so the schools I have worked at cap their classroom sizes at twenty-two students, but that is even worse in classrooms in the United States where due to budgetary concerns, classrooms have exceeded thirty students in them, and I have heard in some places up to fifty-five.
This is why summer is so important to teachers. For those who teach the early years, it is a time to participate in more grown-up activities, to return to that time in their lives where they can once again be adults, to have conversations grounded in logic and reason. For those who teach in secondary schools, it is a time for them to enjoy life free of the hormones and drama that comes with the teenage years, to have days filled with people who are motivated to do what needs to get done and they do not have to be the ones to motivate them, and to have a life free from the constant pressure that their career places on them. It is a time for the teachers to recharge their batteries and get ready to take on the challenges of the next year.
Most summers, it takes a couple of weeks to get caught up on sleep, and find that restful state that is conducive to most other people in the world. It sometimes takes three to four weeks before teachers can let go of the worries of being a teacher and relax enough to feel somewhat human. It is also around this time that teachers start to see the end of summer approaching, so they have to place up mental blocks to avoid the stress that comes with the dawn of a new school year. With that block in place, they can usually to get a place of calm by the start of the school year so they can have the patience and resolve to make it through another one. So when you see a teacher taking it easy for some time have some empathy and understand where they are coming from. It is not an easy job, and the break is a necessary evil so they can do their job well. It is an act of kindness that will go far and help to prepare the next generation of the challenges they will face in this world, hopefully making it a better place overall.
John Collings 