Why We Stay

If you've never been a teacher, you might think our favorite time of year is September.

New notebooks; fresh bulletin boards; perfectly sharpened pencils; a clean slate. The truth?

For me, September is often the hardest month of the year. Actually...September, October, and November. Every summer, while everyone around me is talking about vacations, beach days, and enjoying time off, there's always a little voice in the back of my mind reminding me that a brand-new school year is coming. Meeting a new group of students; new personalities and all new challenges; new unknowns. And if I'm being completely honest, it creates anxiety.

I teach eighth grade English in a district where many of my students face challenges long before they ever walk through my classroom door. Many come from homes where education simply isn't the priority. Some have parents who are overwhelmed themselves. Others have experienced things that no thirteen-year-old should have to experience. Many students arrive believing school isn't for them. Some have already decided they're "bad at English."

Others have learned that not trying hurts less than trying and failing. As teachers, we carry all of that into our classrooms every single day. We spend months trying to build relationships before we can even begin teaching content. We celebrate tiny victories that most people would never notice. We try to convince students that their words matter...that they matter. Some days, it feels impossible. There are afternoons when I drive home wondering if anything I said actually made a difference.

Then something happened this past weekend. I was attending a fundraising golf tournament to support our local high school's football team when I heard someone say, "Hi."

I looked over. I didn't recognize him at first. Then he smiled, told me his name, and suddenly I was transported back several years to when he sat in my eighth-grade English class.

He told me he's now a freshman at the University of Rhode Island. Then he said something I'll never forget. He told me he was working hard on a four-page college essay. He wasn't complaining about it or looking for sympathy. He was excited. He was proud of himself and he wanted me to know. Standing there in the middle of golf clubhouse, I felt something that is difficult to put into words. I was overwhelmed with joy, pride, gratitude, and validation.

For just a few minutes, every stressful day, every difficult conversation, every moment I questioned whether I was making any difference completely disappeared, because suddenly I wasn't thinking about missing assignments or classroom management or standardized tests, or grades. I was looking at a young man who had grown up, a college student. He was was working hard and he was excited to share that with his eighth grade English teacher.

Teachers don't always get immediate results. Actually, most of the time we don't. We plant seeds. We encourage. We redirect. We model. We believe in kids before they believe in themselves. Then they leave. Most of the time, we never know what happened after that.

That's probably the hardest part of teaching. We pour everything we have into children and rarely get to see the finished product. But every once in a while...one of them comes back.

Maybe it's at the grocery store, a football game, a restaurant, or a charity golf tournament.

And in a five-minute conversation, they unknowingly refill a tank that has been running on empty. That conversation reminded me that education isn't measured only by test scores or report cards. Sometimes it's measured years later, when a former student proudly tells you they're writing a college paper. Sometimes it's measured by the confidence in their voice.

Sometimes it's simply knowing they remembered you.

To my fellow educators who are exhausted, discouraged, or wondering if what you're doing matters...it does. Even when you can't see it. Especially when you can't see it. Somewhere out there, one of your former students is succeeding because of something you taught them. Maybe it was grammar. Maybe it was how to organize an essay. Maybe it was simply that you believed they were capable of more. You may never know the impact you had. Until one random day...someone says, "Hi." And suddenly, you remember exactly why you chose this profession. Those moments are rare, but they're powerful enough to carry us through another September. Another October. Another November. Another school year because sometimes all it takes is one former student to remind us that the seeds we planted years ago are finally beginning to grow and there is no greater gift than that.

If you've experienced one of these moments, I'd love to hear your story in the comments.