Letter to the Editor

School has started and there’s a teacher shortage across the nation. It’s a well-known fact that burnout is a common reason. I might have a solution or two that could be tried.

We have dedicated teachers who are reluctantly leaving their teaching positions heartbroken, physically exhausted and emotionally drained, and returning to their families who have sacrificed the attention and energy of their mom or dad for years during each school year.

Teachers are not trained in emotional disturbances, extreme academic needs and trauma-affected children. If they were, their teacher education would resemble that of a medical degree of several years of academic work followed by numerous residencies and internships.

Yet, student behavior takes up much of their time and attention during the school day, compromising everyone’s learning.

Gifted and talented teachers are burning out and it’s not just about student behaviors. It also includes the ways a teacher is spread thin.

They are bombarded with workshops and trainings in a variety of areas, regardless of whether any of the following will improve learning for their students:

• Strategies for handling student anger, defiance and meltdowns

• How to build relationships with the student’s family

• Individualize lessons for the students who learn in different ways

• Assess fairly and accurately

• Reach children of trauma

• Implement yet another new math program and/or reading curriculum complete with visits from the program’s “experts” who fly in from out of state and usually live in a city to let teachers know what they are doing wrong

• Strategies for conflict resolution and teaching anti- bullying skills.

In addition to the above: they are also required to document behavior, have a class behavior plan with fair consequences for offenses along with periodic class meetings to review it all, report cards, parent/teacher conferences, send home encouragement notes that acknowledge the good things their students are doing, find ways to make a student’s birthday special and showcase their strengths in visible ways in the classroom or hallway. Add to that the trainings, seminars, power points, in-services, school committees, book studies, family nights, not to mention all the technology that goes with all of this including writing lesson plans in conjunction with the state standards and lastly: teaching.

Our precious teachers need to receive the same considerations they are expected to give their students.

First of all they need feedback from parents. If parents can’t find anything to thank their child’s teacher for, at least respond to notes and/or forms sent home and show interest in their child’s learning. Not “How was school today?” but how about “What did you use your pencil for? What kind thing did you see someone do for someone else? What made you sad? What made you smile or chuckle?”

K-2nd graders or older would be required to take and complete a summer course in self-management, manners, showing kindness, ability to listen to a story, follow directions and other social skills they are coming to school without.

You parents who are practicing unhealthy parenting can sit back and continue to do so but your children and you will be required to take this course and pass it before any of your children will be admitted to a school.

Secondly, teachers need to be showcased by administration – and not just an “I’m so proud of all of you, thank you for all you do or thank you for a great job” emailed to them after a family night or school event, or handing out insulated water bottles and trinkets at the beginning of the year.

How about taking a class period for a teacher to give them an extra prep that day, or taking lunch duty so teachers can eat in their rooms. In fact, take someone’s recess duty once in a while. Showcase your staff’s birthdays on a bulletin board in the hallway or commons with pictures so students, other staff and parents can see it. Maybe they’d wear a sticker or pin saying it’s my birthday today if they were given one. This provides others, including students an opportunity to engage with their teacher in a different way for a few minutes.

I ask superintendents and principals: when was the last time you noticed a science activity or an art project in one of the classrooms and commented on it to the teacher?

School boards who have so much power are even further removed from what is actually going on in the school.

Teachers did not go into education to get chewed up and spit out by students and/or parents along with being ignored by administration.

What happened to “we’re in it for the kids”? Who’s “we?” Or what about the North Dakota Department of Public Instruction’s latest “Every Student Succeeds Act”? Just how is that supposed to happen?

Sheyenne, N.D.