They Must Be Nuts
The Source
I had no idea what they were doing there. It made no sense. 300 fresh faces staring at me in the ballroom of the Western Illinois Union, dressed smartly, notepads in hand, looking for all the world like the generation you’d most like to see take over our world. But their choice of occupation……well, it made no sense. They were going into teaching. The WIU Education Department, in what must surely have been a desperate attempt to secure a keynote speaker, asked me to drive to Macomb to talk to the current crop of young teachers, now a few weeks into their student teaching assignments. 300 of them. Not a cell phone visible. Not a pair of jeans in the room. These people were serious. But why? They must have been crazy. I officially retired from the public school at a prime time, just before the current crisis in education (as opposed to the previous crisis in education which came just after the other crisis in education). Unless the governor of Illinois wants to suffer the wrath of retired teachers at the voting booth (retired teachers vote at an alarmingly high rate), the money that we’ve paid into our pension fund seems safe. I must stifle my chuckle and hold my fists tightly when I hear someone grouse about “the pensions they pay teachers.” I paid into my pension fund and although some school districts pay a portion of the amount, they simply deduct that from the money they’ve allotted for salaries. ‘Twas not a gift from heaven. But any young man or woman thinking to join the work force of Illinois teachers today might be better to withhold his own retirement money and bury it under a rock where it’ll be safe, far from the fund-raiders in Springfield. And that’s just the money end. WIU had asked me to speak on “the realities of teaching.” A good topic and something that perhaps their college professors could use a little help explaining. I admire university professors and the work they do, but I’ve met few who’ve supervised a Jr. High lunch period, loaded fifth-graders onto the bus during a snowstorm, handled parent-teacher conferences, or have refereed a fight in the boys’ restroom. I had a few things to tell the fresh faces. I basically told them to be prepared to give up most of their life, avoid disgruntled fellow faculty members like the plague, be a boss and not a friend, make their children feel safe, encourage one another, realize that their behavior will teach more than their textbook, and to teach their children to be human. Of the first thousand kids they teach, 350 will live in one-parent homes, 300 won’t graduate, 80 will drop out because of their learning disabilities, 110 will have been bullied this week, 130 will have done the bullying, 200 will suffer depression, and at least statistically, 2 will take their own lives. In other words, this ain’t Sesame Street, boys and girls. And I also told them that there was no one on the Macomb campus that would live as rewarding a life as a teacher, and no one at WIU on that foggy morning held as much power for good. But the amazing…the unbelievable part of the morning was not in what I said, but what they said to me. Afterwards I was able to talk with a few of the new teachers about why they were entering the profession. The pay is embarrassing, the hours are consuming, the immediate rewards are sometimes negligible, and they’ll be blamed for nearly every problem in our society. And then they began to speak… “I had teachers who cared about me. They made me what I am I want to do that with my life….” “I want to make a difference…. “I’d rather make a difference than make money…. “I come from a family of teachers. I already know the downside. ….” “I’m not sure. I just know I have to teach….” And on and on, one encouraging, hopeful answer after another. I was supposed to be the one bringing the message, but the miracle of that morning was the message those young teachers brought to me….There is hope. There is promise. There is reason for all of us to be encouraged. It made no sense…..and it was wonderful.