The challenges of teaching at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic were well documented and don’t need to be repeated.
When the 2021–22 school year started, teachers joyously, apprehensively, welcomed students back into our classrooms; but we quickly realized having our students in the classroom wasn’t the same as it was “before.”
Using the expression “turnover” to describe this academic year is a carefully worded understatement. All of us have lost colleagues to a new career. Some to COVID-19. Most are aware of upcoming resignations, and many hope to include ourselves on that list. Not because we don’t love teaching.
We love teaching; it’s just that we can’t work in an environment that is increasingly hostile to us and to our students’ education. We know we need to leave if we want to be present and fair to our families.
School buildings everywhere are understaffed, so employees who haven’t left the field are dealing with more pressure than ever.
Student behaviors range between shocking apathy and terrifying aggression. Parents are still outraged. Mandatory training hasn’t gone anywhere.
Staff exodus has resulted in larger classes that are more challenging to manage, so students with behavior issues are even harder to reach. Their classmates struggle to focus and learn because teachers are managing behaviors that are more troubling than ever. All students’ risk of becoming lost in the system has increased.
Mass resignations and retirements have also resulted in fewer course offerings. A child who loved Spanish in middle school has a real risk of not being able to continue her course of study in high school because there simply aren’t enough teachers.
Other electives? Good luck. Drama teachers are teaching English classes and English teachers are teaching family life.
Here in Chesapeake, Virginia, public school teachers are covering other teachers’ classes, and countless teachers have sacrificed their planning time to take on the responsibility of teaching an entire extra course. Lack of teaching assistants even further dilutes the quality of lessons teachers are able to deliver.
The standardized testing train is speeding down the track at all of us, where expectations of success have not changed, but expectations of our approach to the tests have. This year, skeletally staffed departments are required to develop remediation courses for identified students, so students have their best opportunity to be successful.
In theory, a wonderful idea. In reality, Chesapeake Public Schools’ Division of Teaching and Learning notified schools of the expectations by memo on Thursday, December 2. We also learned we need to individually prepare for several 30-minute live teaching sessions on top of the remediation courses. Testing begins almost immediately after winter break.
Even with the hardships, staff press on. One measure Chesapeake Public Schools took to alleviate the pressures that staff are coping with is to double the stipend for teachers who cover another teacher’s class from $25 to $50. Not only that, teachers who covered classes earlier in the year will be paid retroactively to September. In a system that is understaffed and unable to procure subs, this effort might represent a good, honest incentive for teachers to continue taking on extra work.
The assistants who are performing the same tasks in addition to managing their own work load are still being overlooked, however.
As a teacher who has both covered 90-minute bells for colleagues and as a teacher who has taught a semester-long course in addition to my contracted three courses, I thought about the different experiences.
Between covering a 90-minute bell and covering an entire course lies a chasm full of additional responsibility, all of which must be completed by the teacher at home. Those teachers are compensated, but what of the 100% increase teachers who take a 90-minute bell were just awarded?
I asked a few colleagues who are teaching an extra bell about their experiences this semester. Given the additional stress on teachers this year, learning that teachers who have an extra bell are feeling more vulnerable and exhausted than ever wasn’t surprising.
I also learned that no teacher seemed to have signed a contract for their willingness to teach an extra bell: the school system hadn’t provided one. While teachers were being paid, no one I talked to had seen the usual contract we receive to teach an extra class. Some teachers reported emails about contracts; others reported they’d had no contact from HR at all. No one, though, had been provided a contract to sign. That news was surprising.
Given the disparity in work for single bell coverage, I emailed the assistant director of HR, Mr. Michael Bailey, on December 2. I requested that CPS review the stipend for extra bells, and to raise teachers’ pay retroactively so they are compensated more fairly, given the 90-minute coverage pay increase.
As of December 4, Mr. Bailey has not replied. Fair enough, given the scope of the request. The review and release of funds could not happen overnight.
However, some events do seem to have happened overnight.
On Friday, December 3, educators across the city teaching extra bells received emails indicating they need to sign and return their contracts by the end of the day. In some cases, HR called schools directly to instruct administrators to have the contracts signed.
Some building level administrators interrupted teachers’ classes to personally inform them of the directive and to relay the expectation that the contract be signed immediately. Some teachers signed their contracts, some didn’t, but many noticed that the contract they had never received was dated Tuesday, September 21.
Reagan Davis, president of the Chesapeake Education Association, reached out to Chesapeake Public Schools’ Director of HR, Dr. Brian Austin, on Saturday, December 4, regarding the pay disparity and his real concern that teachers might very well be unwilling to pick up extra bells next semester.
Given that teachers can now earn almost the same pay with no responsibility by covering individual bells a few times a week, Mr. Davis’s fear has real potential to be realized.
Teachers’ common sense decision to decline teaching an extra bell in the spring would be devastating. Administrators and staff are already at a breaking point. Chesapeake Public Schools should recognize the gravity of this situation and prioritize funds to implement meaningful, permanent stipend increases for staff immediately.
Building staff know the resources and courses we have to offer our students is diminishing. Our students are losing out on learning, opportunities, and services. These issues will not improve until Chesapeake Public Schools treat their staff with respect and compensate them fairly.
