And it has nothing to do with the kids. Even the worst of their behavior I could tolerate.
It is the administration and all of their authoritarian, exploitative bullshit that ultimately drove me out.
I left the classroom in October after all of the instability gave me a breakdown / ASD burnout. I started teaching online, but I don't get paid over the summer. I applied to teach summer classes to generate additional income, and I was offered a position with good enough pay, so…yeah, okay. No problem.
But, wait. Of course, immediately, there's a goddamn problem.
I was offered the position this past Monday, the 9th. I've been staying at home supervising the virtual education of my 9 and 11 year old daughters. I went to enroll them in summer school because I'm going to be teaching it.
I found out that for whatever reason, the cutoff date for them was May 2nd.
So, here I am… There's a teacher shortage, and I'm a licensed teacher ready to go in and do full-time work for the duration of the program. But due to the fact that I wasn't even offered the job until a week after this deadline, apparently, I'm not able to enroll my own children.
I didn't apply for this for them before the deadline because no one made me a job offer at that time. If I was going to be home with them, then I had no interest in summer school.
I have emailed and called the people in charge to appeal for an exception for my kids since I am someone trying to come and fill a position they are struggling to fill and I shouldn't have to be faced with finding a way to pay for full-time 40+ hour a week care for seven weeks because honestly doing so is going to all but negate any money I make from teaching. I've begged, I've pleaded, I've explained why I've missed the deadline and why I need this exception to be made.
And they are literally fucking ignoring my emails and calls.
I desperately need this money but I'm gonna be unable to get it because I'll be working to goddamn pay for childcare.
My husband is like, fuck them. Let them not respond to you. Push it all the way up to the first day and bring the kids with you and if they tell you that you can't have your kids there, fucking turn around and leave and let them enjoy having no one to fill a whole classroom.
I very well might. But my GOD. Teacher shortage?! Ah, yes, let's fucking work to resolve this by treating the rare teacher willing to step up and help out like complete and utter dog shit and do nothing to meet her the fuck halfway.
As I said… thanks for the reminder as to why I noped the fuck out in October. Good to know. Really, really good to know.