Dawning of a new year

Here I go: another school year begins tomorrow and with it some significant changes. I am happy for the change. I am glad to do work that I feel has more worth. I am ready to feel more fulfilled. But, there are some things I forgot about being a classroom teacher. I forgot how sometimes we get stepped on. I forgot how it is a culture of complaint. I forgot that there is a lack of resources to do our job well. I forgot the feeling that grows inside of me: resentment, confusion, fatigue. I am a different person going into this job than I was many years ago starting my teaching career. I am glad for that. I am glad for the roots I have planted that will allow me to weather more storms and be a better person at the end of it.

I fear that I will get caught up in the negativity. I fear that I will be shunned. I fear that I will be disliked. I am anxious.

I am thrilled about the opportunity I have to try new things. My mind runs constantly with ideas, scenarios and…fear. It sits like a stone under my ribs. It makes it harder to breath. It makes me want to pace around, I am unable to sit still. It becomes a flush on my cheeks, a bad taste in my mouth. It clouds my thinking. It squeezes my heart. I make my eyes feel raw.
When I left last year, I knew something in a way I had never known it before and that was that I need to be free. I need to act and dream and create and do so as my will compels me. Teaching, while rewarding and fulfilling, does not provide freedom. It squashes it under a big heavy boot. Schools have potential for freedom and creativity and transformation, but they continue to squander resources, mismanage people and children and waste their potential on rigor.

Synonyms for rigor: strictness, severity, stringency, toughness, harshness, inflexibility, scrupulousness. Synonyms for creative: inventive, imaginative, innovative, experimental, original, artistic, expressive, inspired, visionary, enterprising, resourceful.

Do we want rigorous schools? Or creative ones? Do we want our students to feel they were held to rigorous standards or creative ones? Do I want to be part of something rigorous or creative? Is it really a choice? Ah well...another year begins.