Kristen's Notes

When Taylor Swift started releasing songs off the new Midnights Album, one song really just hit for me. Like on some deep level I felt it. The song in question, was Bejeweled.

Honestly I didn’t really understand why. The song itself is about a woman who is making it clear to her lover that she doesn’t feel appreciated and that just because she’s been devoted, it doesn’t mean she always has to be.

I feel pretty lucky in that I’m pretty happy in my relationship. I do feel appreciated, and I have no desire to step out. So why did I keep waking up in the morning to my brain helpfully supplying lines like I made you my world, have you heard? but I can reclaim the land. I miss you, but I miss sparkling?

And then I realized: Bejewled doesn’t speak to how I feel in my relationship, it speaks to how I feel in my career. Honestly, teaching in America is kind of like waking up every day in an abusive relationship. I know that no one wants to hear teachers whine, but it doesn’t mean that teachers don’t have valid complaints to whine about.

The district I teach in now is far and away the best district I have taught in. I get paid more, I have a strong union, I don’t have to pay $5 to wear jeans on Fridays. But even in the district I work in, there’s a lack of clarity around curriculum, our contract went more than a year without being settled and the back pay we have been owed for more than a year as a result of that contract fight hasn’t materialized, even though our contract was ratified 5 months ago.

Teachers show up every day having put in the work to create engaging and differentiated lessons for their students and often spend a considerable amount of their own money to make their classrooms inhabitable (baby love I think I’ve been a little too kind). What do they get in return? More work, more expectations and platitudes about our why or how we are here for the outcome not the income. Its true, I do love my students and I enjoy teaching, but it is still a job. A career. And just like any other job it should be treated like one.

However, all across this country teachers are instead demonized. In some states they aren’t even allowed to have libraries in their classrooms for fear that they will groom students into some lifestyle that their parents don’t approve of. (did all the extra credit then got graded on a curve) I guess maybe that’s true if all you want your kid to be is ignorant and illiterate, but I promise you between testing calendars, observations, meetings and curriculum re-writes I don’t have time to groom your child into anything.

Now we’re in the middle of a teacher shortage crisis and districts are scrambling to try to figure out how to combat that. Teachers have been asked to do too much for too long, and states and districts have just acted like they had no other choice. The fact is though, teachers have a lot of marketable skills, and teachers are leaving the profession in droves for higher paying jobs in the corporate world where there is more home-work balance, and more reasonable expectations for work performance. And corporate employers are happily hiring. (best believe I’m still bejewled, when I walk in the room, I can make the whole place shimmer)

As a teacher, I get told often that I’m a superhero, and I’m doing a job no one else can. I’m not trying to hurt the feelings of the well meaning people who say things like that, but I’m not a super hero, and I’m only doing a job that other people are apparently too smart to take on. I’m really tired of hearing it. What I really want is on time paychecks, and a work load that isn’t ridiculous. Teachers deserve it, and so do the kids that are in our classrooms.

So can we fix this? Maybe. (and you can try to change my mind, but you might have to wait in line) It’s going to take some effort though.

Don’t put me in the basement
When I want the penthouse of your heart
Diamonds in my eyes
I polish up real, I polish up real nice