I Made It!

Imade it! Fifty percent of new teachers leave the profession within the first five years of teaching. As I began my sixth year of teaching I realized that I had not become the most common teaching statistic. I would like to share some of my personal experiences and highlight the things that helped me stick it out. I also want to state that this is what helped me. Each of us teach in different school districts, in different locations around the state, with different students, parents, administrative teams and opportunities. What worked for me may not work for you.

My story

I took over teaching at my alma mater, teaching in the same program I went through. This had some clear advantages, as I knew how the program worked and the inherent value system was very much the same as my own. The biggest challenge I had was a lack of confidence stemming from a lack of knowledge. My job started as a half time position where I, for the first two years, felt I had lots of time. When I began my third year however, I was split between my high school program and my own middle school feeder. This created both additional advantages and challenges. My schedule was dictated by three other schedules: the self-contained 6th grade, the 7th and 8th grade schedule of the middle school, and the high school. This required additional travel time not supplied by the district but allowed me to arrange and keep an early bird Jazz class that allowed more high school students to stay in the program.

My program is seeing record enrollment (compared to the last 10-15 years). Students are getting better instruction as I am developing my methods of assessment. In my five years of teaching I have had some ups and downs, things that worked for me and some that did not. I am going to describe each year as a summary of some journal entries that I made throughout that year. They are only representations of my failures and successes during my first five years. If you are a new teacher I hope I might shed some light on the issues you might be dealing with; if you are a veteran teacher, the stories may bring back personal memories of your own blunders and successes.

First year teaching (half time)

I like to look back on this year as “Ignorance is bliss”. I started my teaching career taking the reins from my own high school band director, Jim Howell. His program, while small, was a well oiled machine. I did not have to do much. Students just did what they were supposed to do. The band parents handled meetings, drum majors handled teaching marching techniques and I just worked the music. Wow, bliss. I picked my favorite tunes from college and high school that I could still remember, did light score study on them, and ran rehearsals

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