Ben Guest’s Blog

Teacher Shortage

2008-03-24T14:56:40Z

The Clarion-Ledger has an article in today's paper about the teacher shortage in Mississippi. Here is a quote:

"In 2006, Mississippi graduated 1,387 education majors. Of those, 937 worked in the state's public schools the following year.

But with about 5,500 teachers eligible to retire, those 937 can't even begin to address the state's need.

Moreover, McNair says the state estimates that 50 percent of new teachers will leave the profession within five years. Another 3,000 teachers have between 20 and 24 years of experience, meaning they, too, will soon be eligible to retire.

The problem gets worse in rural parts of the state and in harder-to-fill subject areas such as math, science, foreign languages and special education.

Of the 2006 education majors, there were 54 in special education, 42 in math, 20 in biology, eight in chemistry, two in physics and about 14 foreign language education majors. Although the state offers loan forgiveness and other incentives, it's still coming up short. Last year, fewer than 1,000 people became teachers through alternate routes."

For the past several months the CL has allowed online comments, which I find as interesting as the articles. Here's a gem from the above article:

"After having taught for 30 years in Jackson Public and Hinds County Schools the problems I see are number 1 - the family life of children is not much because parents are both working and the kids fend for themselves, and their is not much family relationships. The parents are not showing responsbility for their child's education. The teachers are responsible for teaching home values and everything that child learns plus the academics. Children need love from the teacher as well as the parent. Teachers are afraid of being sued by parents. I applaud all teachers for what they do each day in the classroom."

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Attrition: A Conclusion

2008-03-17T21:59:32Z

Last in a series of posts on attrition .

So, if everything I have said about attrition is accurate, especially that education in Mississippi is a battle that has already been lost, why should anyone join the Mississippi Teacher Corps?

First answer: There is a dignity, a nobility even, in fighting for something worthwhile, even if the cause is lost.

Second answer: Did you have a teacher that made a difference in your life? Yes. A great example is Crystal, a first-year Teacher Corps participant, who was inspired to become a teacher by two MTC teachers.

Crystal

Third Answer: It was fairly easy, in my last post, to find blogs posts about the difficulties of teaching. It is even easier to find posts about the rewards: Some deal with sports, like Anna's track team, Dani's basketball team, Mike's soccer team, and Hunter's baseball team. Some deal with afterschool activities like Dave's state championship Quiz Bowl team or Jake and Dave's Civil Rights/Civil Liberties Club. But most deal with the experience. Click here and read anyone.

Fourth Answer: Several years ago, Andrew Myler, part of the Class of 2001, came and talked with the incoming first-years. While in MTC he taught in Cleveland. Upon completion of the program he took a job teaching in Nashville. "I'm not a crier," he said, "but the day I left and drove the four hours to Nashville, I cried the whole way."

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On Ambiguity

2008-03-16T18:50:11Z

"A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where his influence stops.

Henry Adams

"Making a difference, one child at a time."

Mississippi Teacher Corps Motto

"That's sweeping leaves on a windy day."

The Deacon

This is the second to last in a series of posts on attrition.

Even a cursory glance at the blogs will show the struggles that our teachers go through. The truth is, making a difference one child at a time sucks. For the amount of effort our teachers put in, and the amount of time and money that goes into Teacher Corps, the return on investment should be much higher. In reality, the return may be even lower. It is rare that one of our teachers makes a life-changing difference in a student's life. Sad, but true. Our teachers have students for 50 minutes a day, 30 or so at a time. That is about 2 minutes of individual attention in a 50 minute period. For the other 23 hours that student is at the mercy of a vast system, a system located at the intersection of race and poverty and that is rigged to allow only a few to succeed (at some point I may expand on this in a separate post, but to be brief: in the past, when America [and the south in particular, and Mississippi in specific] needed labor to work the cash crop fields, cheap [free] labor was brought in, at the point of a gun. That is capitalism. Capitalism values profit over people. Hundreds of years later, we no longer need a labor-intensive workforce. Manufacturing jobs have been exported to third-world countries [for cheap labor]. Simply put, today there are many more working adults than there are jobs. And a deep recession is on its way). Capitalism is about winners. And if you've got winners, than you have to have losers. Which is fine in theory, may the best man win. But in practice, the game is rigged to allow those who are already ahead to stay ahead, and those behind (despite NCLB [I encourage you to take a minute a poke around the official NCLB website. It sucks]) to stay behind. A few make it and we call those success stories, but as Dave M., once pointed out the mere fact that we refer to those few as success stories proves the system is broken.

An oft-used metaphor is of a teacher throwing pebbles into a lake, the ripples spreading out into eternity. For the students in the Delta communities, in inner-city Jackson, in the rural hill country, school districts that have more than 95% of their students on free lunch (meaning they come from a household living below the poverty level), it's more like throwing pebbles down a well. As I have said many times, the battle for education in Mississippi has been fought and lost. We are simply working amidst the wreckage of a failed system. What we do is sweep leaves on a windy day. Coming to terms with that, realizing that the effect we have is minimal, that the system is broken, can be difficult, especially for a first-year teacher who is already overwhelmed. If we are not making a difference, what is the point? What is the effect that a Teacher Corps teacher truly has? I like to use the metaphor of a sundial. By the time an MTC teacher gets a student (we teach grades 7 through 12), the student is already well down the path to success or to failure. All we do is move the dial a few more degrees in his or her favor. And if that is all, and if, even worse, you will most likely never know your impact (or lack thereof), why join the Teacher Corps? Hell, why manage the Teacher Corps? Answers in my conclusion post later this week.

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Favorite MTC Posts

2008-03-14T23:02:49Z

I'm working on my last two posts about attrition: a post on ambiguity and then a conclusion post. In working on the ambiguity post, which I hope to have up by Sunday, I started reading through some of the MTC Class of 2005's final blog entries (they finished in May of 2007), reflecting back on their Teacher Corps experience. Here are some of my favorites:

Elizabeth Savage: What seems impossible is simply a challenge to be met-- logically, step by step, one obstacle at a time. It's important, always, to remember the necessity of self-discipline. I think of this, in a large part, as growing up-- realizing the direct connection between action and consequence, between method and result.

To sum it up, Teacher Corps is where I finally became an adult in anything more than name. To know what is important to me, to set a goal, to ultimately create a meaningful and significant positive impact-- this is what will justify my existence on this planet, this is what makes my life worth living, this is what I can accomplish, now that I have learned order and discipline. For me, a life ruled by ego and unmitigated by compassion would be a waste of time.

Robbie Pollack: I remember reading that the University of Mississippi had banned sticks in its stadium, in an effort to reduce the number of Confederate flags at games without overtly violating first amendment freedoms. There was quite a hullabaloo apparently. I laughed about it, I think. I doubt I would have been confident to say that no such place existed, that no such controversy would erupt, that nobody cared about or took seriously that sort of thing, but I was surprised by it anyway. It seemed so strange and quaint. So archaic. I probably reflected on it for a few seconds, but if I had a thousand years I don't think it would have occurred to me that I might one day live and work in that state, attend courses at and be awarded a degree from that very school.

Dave Molina (and I have to say this is one of my favorite posts any MTCer has written. Dave was decidedly unexcited about writing this final reflection [it was the last required MTC post, hence the "give me my cake" line at the end] but I think he did a fantastic job in describing his experience over the two years starting with...): spring '05 wherein the protagonist applies to a slew of teaching programs: MTC, Worldteach, TFA, etc. ben guest contacts him and is very persuasive. plans are made to come to mississippi and teach math, rather than go to china again, or to continue the TFA process. primary selling point: intimacy of small program, organizational support, and free master's degree.

Jake Roth (fitting that he comes after Dave): But this isn’t what I want to talk about. I want to talk about AK. AK was a soft-spoken 4^th-period honors freshman whom I failed. Sure, heearned a 60% or whatever – but I failed him. I had him so many times, and not once did I actually win.

Ugly Cake: MTC has been an incredibly memorable experience, as I’m sure the first two years of teaching always are, but I can’t say it’s been the best time of my life. I can say it has been the hardest thing I’ve ever done. It’s been a time when all your weaknesses and faults are exposed and are exaggerated. Your life rarely goes outside of teaching, planning, or grading, as is evident by the constant vis-à-vis marker remnants on fingers and how conversations too often revolve around what James did or what the principal didn’t do or what Rachel said.

Matt Lochen: The Mississippi Teacher Corps produced some of the finest teachers I have known and it has been a privilege working and learning along side them throughout the past two years.

Anderson Heston: I write this at the close of one chapter of my life and the opening of another. I have survived my two years in the wilderness, and I am stronger for it. I can think of nothing harder than getting up every morning and getting up in front of those kids. I have been knocked about like no other, but I am still here to tell my story.

Reading over this post, before I hit the "Save" button on Vox that will present this for the world to read, I feel...

Wonder. At how many great writers have come through this program.

Nostalgia. I am going on five years as program manager. Groups have come and gone...

Pride. I played a part in bringing these incredible individuals to the students of Mississippi.

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On Motivation...

2008-03-06T15:19:32Z

This started out as a reply to Holly’s comment on my previous post and grew from there (Holly, I appreciate the comments. As I'm sure y'all know by now, I love a good difference of opinion)...

Does money matter when it comes to teaching?

The highest-paid profession in the US, according to Forbes, is anesthesiology, with a mean salary of $184,000. To become an anesthesiologist requires 12 years of specialized training, including an undergraduate major in pre-med (or a hard science), admission to medical school, three years of medical school, and a one-year residency. Along the way, the future anesthesiologist must pass the MCAT and become board certified (by comparison, 9% of teachers in Mississippi are board-certified, which ranks us 3rd in the nation). Each one of these steps is a highly competitive process. The bar is set incredibly high. Yet, there is no shortage of anesthesiologists in this country. To become a certified teacher, in Mississippi, requires a four-year degree in any subject from any college in the country with a minimum GPA of 2.5, passing scores on the Praxis I and II (about the easiest standardized test on the planet), and completion of an eight-week online program from Teach Mississippi Institute (or three weeks with “Alternate Pathways”). The bar is set incredibly low. Yet, we have a huge shortage. And a mean salary of $40,000.

Do you have to be motivated by altruism to be a good teacher?

I am completely uninterested in a person's motivation to become a teacher. If someone is a good teacher, who cares why he or she became a teacher? If we pay teachers a million dollars a year, and people become teachers primarily for the money, and they are good at it, great. Put another way, if you have to love the profession of teaching to be a great teacher, why should we pay teachers anything?

If the first-year teaching salary was a million dollars, the teacher shortage would end tomorrow. Over five years, tens of thousands of low-performing teachers would be flushed from the profession by the influx of good teachers. Teacher-training programs would become competitive and could raise standards rather than being a cash-cow for the universities. Low-performing education majors would be washed out because there would no longer be pressure to turn out certified teachers to address the teacher shortage...

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Time and Attrition

2008-03-05T14:13:48Z

Posts on attrition here and here. Here are the posts on low pay, classroom management, intensity, administration, outside issues, and promotion.

Last week's issue of Time had a cover story on "How to Make Better Teachers." Included in that article is a survey, not available online, of former teachers as to why they left the profession. I have now purchased said issue of Time (for $4.95, which seems incredibly high to me. In fact, I bought an issue of Newsweek as well and the total came to more than ten dollars), and reproduce the results here for you (and while I'm not the smartest person in the world, I'm assuming teachers polled could cite more than one reason as these numbers add up to way more than 100):

Top Reasons Teachers Cited for Leaving the Profession in 2001

Lack of Time to Prepare-60%

Too Heavy a Teaching Load-51%

Class Size Too Large-50%

Poor Salary or Benefits-48%

Student Behavioral Problems-44%

Lack of Influence in School-42%

It is interesting to note that Student Behavioral Problems (or, put another way, classroom management) is second to last.

Of course, the overarching point is that all of the reasons are in relation to the pay. In other words, 50% leave the profession because class size is too large in relation to the pay. If the first-year teaching salary was a million dollars teachers leaving the profession would plummet and quality people entering the profession would skyrocket. It is all about incentives...

Promotion

2008-03-04T15:15:35Z

Posts on attrition here and here. Here are the posts on low pay, classroom management, intensity, administration, and outside issues.

Promotion to an administrative position as a reason for leaving the teaching profession is a rare case as far as Teacher Corps goes. Only a handful of our teachers, so far, have gone on to become school administrators. Hopefully, that will change in the next few years with the start of the Mississippi Principal Corps. The Principal Coprs (MPC) is scheduled to begin in June of 2009.

While promotion may be rare in the case of MTC participants it is quite common in the K-12 field as a whole. The state of Mississippi requires that a public school administrator have at least three years of experience as a teacher. While it can certainly be beneficial for a school principal to have teaching experience this policy creates two distinct problems:

1) A good teacher is taken out of the classroom. A school principal, by law, has to make more money than the most veteran teacher on staff. So, there is an economic incentive (slight as it is) to become an administrator. An outstanding teacher desires to earn more money, becomes certified in administration, and is promoted (or hired by another school district) to become an administrator, thus leaving his or her classroom with a poor replacement. Often, the thinking by the school board is that Mr. Smith made a good teacher so he will make a good principal. However, the skills of a good principal and the skills of a good teacher are not necessarily the same (although organization is the most important skill in each position).

2) A poor principal is put in the office. A good teacher does not a good principal make. Often the most important skill a principal possesses is that of being able to successfully navigate school board and district office politics. School administrator is a political position. Unfortunately, the primary skill of being a politician (collecting and delivering favors) doesn't translate into good management of a school. A good school principal must be focused on the students of the school (in action, not just in words). However, for a principal to survive, he or she must be able to please the superintendent and school board (usually backed by powerful parents in the community), who may or may not have the best interest of the students at heart. In that "choice" the school board, superintendent, and powerful parents, will always win out...

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Outside Issues

2008-02-26T01:24:29Z

Posts on attrition here and here. Posts on low pay, classroom management, intensity, and administration.

Outside issues, as a reason for leaving the teaching profession, can include anything from having to take care of an ill family member to moving to another country. These are self-explanatory and I don't have much to add except for one factor: significant others.

Over the past four years (and 100 or so participants) I would estimate that we have had ten first-year participants who have moved to Mississippi with a significant other. This can sometimes pose problems for the couple. Let's look at it from the perspective of the significant other who is not in the program and not teaching. Having a husband or wife (or girlfriend or boyfriend) in the Teacher Corps can be difficult for several reasons:

1) You are no longer the most important person in the world. Well, you are, but your spouse (I'll be using "spouse" and "significant other" interchangeably) no longer has any time for you. As I've written previously, being in the Teacher Corps is an all-encompassing experience. There is so much required of a first-year teacher that he or she has little time to do anything outside of school-related issues.

2) You don't understand what your spouse is going through. Your significant other is going through a myriad of emotions and experiences, all away from you. There are a lot of highs and lows and you don't get to experience any of them, except through your spouse. They are your spouse's experiences, not your own.

3) You can't help. You've never done what your spouse is doing, teaching 120 kids in a critical-needs school, so there is not a lot of advice you can give. You feel helpless. When you try to offer advice, your spouse dismisses it because, "You don't understand."

4) You are in the Delta. You don't know anybody. There is nothing to do. You can't find a job. You want to move back home.

5) Your partner is miserable. You want your partner to be happy. If teaching is making him or her miserable, then he or she should stop teaching.

Any combination of these can be tough on a relationship. All of them together can be toxic. Usually either the relationship or the career in teaching will falter. Do those of you who are married, or have a significant other living with you, have any thoughts/experiences to add?

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Intensity

2008-02-21T23:13:48Z

Over the next few days I will be exploring different reasons for why teachers leave the profession. I have already posted on low pay and classroom management. The first two posts on attrition are here and here.

The intensity of teaching is the factor most often cited by MTCers as to why they are leaving the profession after two years (dealing with difficult administration is a close second). It is impossible to explain to someone who has never taught just how consuming it is to be a teacher. The best I can do is offer an example: Several years ago Lawrence Hardy, a reporter for the American School Board Journal, did a story on one of our teachers, Sarah Alford, in Humphrey County High School. Hardy shadowed Sarah for two days, through class, through professional development, through play practice. When I met with him at the end of the second day he was exhausted. And all he had done was observe (interesting side note: the editor of that piece, titled A Place Apart, was Michelle Sabatier, now a first-year in the Teacher Corps).

Let me put it another way: As a teacher, every second of every day is accounted for (with the exception of a planning period). Every second of every day you are responsible for 30 teenagers: their health, their well-being, and their education. You are always ON. You cannot use the bathroom without first finding someone to cover your class, you cannot take a break, you cannot leave the classroom for any reason. When I first started my current job, as Program Manager of the Teacher Corps, I was amazed. I could use the bathroom whenever I wanted. I could take an hour for lunch. I could leave early or come late if I had an errand to run. I could take a day off and not worry if the sub was letting the kids destroy the classroom. It’s not that teaching is simply filled with long hours (although it is). It’s that they are intense hours. You finish the day exhausted, wiped out, and with several hours of planning or grading or parent calls or coaching ahead of you. As I tell the first-years during the initial summer training, this is an all-encompassing experience. For the next year you will not have time for anyone but your closest friends and family. That’s how intense this job is. For those interested in the program the only way to approximate the intensity of teaching is to not sleep for three days and then go substitute teach for two days.

Now, the good news is that it does get easier. Once you have a cache of lesson plans and you are a known teacher at the school (rather than a first-year who has parachuted in from Mars), teaching is a great job to have. But that is little consolation during the first year…

On top of this is the incredible, unbelievable need of the students. The students our teachers teach, the kids, have been neglected by the forces of education for years. Their deficiencies in various subjects is enormous. They need an incredible amount of good teaching to make up this gap, more than our teachers, or anyone, can provide.

On top of this are the other needs. At times, our teachers assume the role of counselor, nurse, big brother, and parent. Our kids have grown up in the dark underbelly of the American Dream, and their neglect, in all areas, is staggering.

On top of this is the general inefficiency of the school administration to support our teachers or to help address the needs of the students.

And, finally, on top of this is the perfectionism of our teachers. Many of our teachers come from the top schools and/or academic programs in the country. Many of them have been successful at every single thing they have ever put their mind to, no matter how difficult. And now, they are confronted with a situation that is insolvable, no matter how much work is put in, no matter how much effort is expended. So, they do what they have always done when faced with this kind of situation: work harder. And harder. And harder. Until there is nothing left. Until finally they come up against the hard truth. The system is broken. For the students, there will be few successes and many failures. The system is broken. For the students, only the smartest and the strongest and the luckiest will make it. And that is a hard thing to realize.

More Thoughts on Attrition

2008-02-19T00:44:47Z

Last week's post on attrition drew a lot of well-thought out comments. I've been letting these comments bounce around for awhile and have come up with some more thoughts.

Here are all the reasons I can come up with for why people leave the teaching profession:

1) Low pay/Better paying job in another field
2) Struggles with classroom management
3) Struggles with the intensity of teaching
4) Struggles with disorganized/chaotic/demeaning administration
5) Outside issues (illness/marriage/moving to a foreign country)
6) Promotion to an administrative position
7) Ambiguity of impact
8) ?

Over the next few days I plan to examine each of these issues. What reasons am I missing?

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