I Quit Teaching

I did it...I quit teaching. I am part of a huge exodus of teachers this year. I've been in my district for 14 years, one year away from my 15 year pin. I've had a lot of people tell me "you worked so hard to get where you are, don't throw it away!" I am most definitely not throwing anything away! My husband said it best, maybe what you thought was your final destination is really only a pit stop preparing you for greater things. He said it best and I truly believe him.

The education system is broken. There are so many troubling events happening in our world already, and those events are impacting education. Teachers should just be able to teach. Not indoctrinate their beliefs on students or preach for political gains, but to be a teacher and teach students. Teachers can't just teach to kids anymore. Why? Well, that is because we are told how we are to teach. We have to go to so many trainings and are told we have to teach all these different programs. We have meetings to prepare for meetings. We have no more time to actually prepare for fun teaching. Everything is about data and teaching kids how to pass a test. My lightbulb moment was when I was in a "data" meeting and we were told, "Be strategic who you pull for small groups. We want to focus on kids who are borderline of reaching masters (top level of passing and understanding) to raise our scores." So we were supposed to be focusing only on students who were going to raise our school scores, not students who needed help with certain skills that they didn't understand. That's just the tip of the iceberg. There are so many things...BUT I made a choice. I decided to focus on my kids and start putting my 3 amazing kiddos before my students. I made the choice to play with my daughter when she asked me to play instead of saying, "I can't right now. I have to get this done for school."

I'm being an example for my kiddos and showing them what passion is. I want them to know and see that I put them first and everything else jobwise will just fall into place. I've started this amazing blog, which I'm super pumped about because I've wanted to do it for so long! I'm going to work on my craft side business. I've looked into working as an editor or proofreader for a publisher, also a dream of mine (to work for a publisher). I'll start to work on my writing and fingers crossed get published! Guess what?! I already have an interview lined up to be a tutor! I can make the same amount I did teaching and only tutor 20 hours a week! Good things are in store for my family, just wait and see!