Tag Archives: education

General Posts

Sunday Evening Ramblings

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This post is my attempt to put into words what I’ve been feeling about my life and career if for no other reason than to make sense of it for myself.  Perhaps this is something I shouldn’t admit publicly, but the best word that comes to mind is desperate.  I feel like my window is closing.  That may just be a product of turning 40, but I truly feel like my chances of having a breakthrough during my lifetime are growing slimmer by the day.  I still believe in the quality of my work and still maintain that I’ve grown and improved with each book, but what I’ve never had is that one big moment, that tipping point when word of mouth and momentum become self-sustaining.  I used to tell myself it was just a matter of time, but now, I’m not so sure.

I don’t want fame or wealth, either.  I don’t need to sell millions of books to validate myself.  What I do need is to earn a living as a writer, but it seems like there is very little middle ground today.  You either have a runaway bestseller or are mired in obscurity.  At least that’s my perception.  The bestsellers today are rarely the best books, either.  Sorry Twilight fans, but those books always have been and always will be vapid piles of poorly written, steaming horseshit.  The fact that Stephanie Meyer never has to work another day makes it hard not to be bitter.  But I digress.

I feel trapped in education.  Trapped.  A suffocating kind of trapped. A long, slow soul crushing kind of trapped.  Every single time I have to drive to and walk inside the high school, a little piece of me dies.  I’m not a high school teacher in any way, shape, or form, and I can’t begin to explain how depressing the environment is.  Every time I grade semi-literate, poorly organized, poorly formatted essays from supposed college students, I feel myself getting dumber.  I feel my own writing skills eroding from the overexposure to inane shit.  Every time I have to re-explain basic instructions to supposed college students, only to have half of them completely ignore me for whatever reason, I feel like screaming.  I want out so desperately I can’t stand myself, but finding a new career is easier said than done in this economy.  I’m also afraid that a career change now will mean the end of my writing career, as well.

I never expected a writer’s life to be easy, but I didn’t expect it to be this hard, either.  The rules have changed at least three times already in my 20+ years in this business.  What was once gospel is now obsolete, and no one I’ve met actually knows what the landscape will be tomorrow.  It’s maddening to navigate uncharted territory with little more than a flashlight.  Then, of course, as if things weren’t difficult enough already, Facebook decided to pull a bait and switch and betray those of us who had spent years building up our fan base on their platform.  Now, I’m scrambling to learn the foreign language known as Twitter.

I’m trying to channel my feelings of desperation into a sense of urgency.  Those who’ve worked in sales know what I mean.  Urgency breeds excitement, and excitement is contagious.  For the next few months, I plan to make a big push and use every sales, marketing, promotional technique I know.  I’ll try to hit a few shows, pursue as many avenues as I can, and make my best possible effort to make this happen.  One way or the other, I will not walk through the doors of that high school next fall.  One way or the other, at least that part of my career will change.

General Posts

Wednesday Afternoon Ramblings

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I’ve been an educator for 14 years, over a third of my life. When I first began, even as a lowly graduate assistant, I had near autonomy in the classroom. There were basic course guidelines, but virtually all of the design was left to my discretion, from day to day instruction to essay prompts. The rationale was that in the marketplace of ideas, effective educators would thrive and the rest would weed themselves out.

For the first couple of years, I struggled to find my stride. Like most young teachers, I thought my job was to cover as much ground as I could. Then, I figured out on my own that students learned much more if I focused on essential fundamentals and strove for quality in those basics. My real job, as I learned, was to teach people how to teach themselves.

I hope it doesn’t come across as too arrogant to say that for many years, I was a great teacher. Dozens of students came back long after my class was over, when there was no incentive to do so, and thanked me for helping them succeed in college. I’m deeply proud of the work I did and the lives I touched.

Today, I’m a shell of that person. The system has burned me out and used me up. I still try to give my best, but I simply have little left. I feel it when I try to lecture, when I grade, when I trudge out the door dreading each day. There are numerous reasons for my burn out, and I’ve written about them quite often. One of the biggest, however, is the slow erosion of autonomy.

Each semester, the state dictates more and more of what we do in the classroom. Each semester, we have less authority over what and how we teach. The trend is toward homogeneous curriculum. In theory and on the surface that sounds reasonable, but anyone who knows anything substantive about education should be able to tell you that the key to effectiveness is adaptation to specific student needs based off specific instructor strengths.

I hate hating a job I once loved. I miss leaving the house each day thrilled that I get paid to share my knowledge and passion for a subject I adore. I miss getting to work one on one with students, knowing not only their names but their specific writing deficiencies, too. I miss feeling like what I do actually matters.

Today, we as educators are stuck between bureaucracies that see us as disposable, replaceable commodities and students who see us as obstacles to success. There simply aren’t words to convey the sadness, frustration, anger, and sense of betrayal I feel over what has been done to my profession.

Part of me wants to hang on for one more year to have my retirement vested. It’s not much money, but it’s enough that I’d like to have it. Part of me wants to walk away today. All of me recognizes that I have to get out soon. My primary goal and focus has always been to write, and somehow I have to make that happen now.  I’m not sure how I’ll break through the locked gate, but somehow, I must. There simply isn’t any way I can continue in this system under these conditions.

General Posts

Saturday Afternoon Ramblings

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Here’s why I find myself growing angry and bitter.  By the terms of my divorce, based on Tennessee law, my child support is based on a ratio between my income and solely the mother’s, and the time we each have the boys.  Because she doesn’t work, I’m required to pay roughly 30% of my take home income, regardless of what her household income is.  Financially, that’s crippling and affects my ability to spend time with my sons.  Furthermore, I have no oversight on how that money is spent.  None.  In addition to that, I get no tax break on that money.  My taxes are based on gross income, so some years I actually owe money at the end of the year, despite living well below the poverty line.

If I don’t pay child support, I can face jail time for contempt of court.  If I don’t pay it, even though I have no way of ensuring that money is spent on my children, I’m labeled a deadbeat dad, not just by the law but also by society.  Don’t get me wrong, I have no issue with supporting my children.  I would do anything for them.  What I have a problem with is the imbalance of the laws that have crippled me financially for at least twelve more years, offer me no safeguards that the money is used for its intended purpose, and in effect enslave me to that obligation, regardless of whether or not she actually needs the money.

So I work, pay the money, and scrape by on what’s left.

My profession is education.  Aside from writing, that’s what I’m best at doing.  Today, because our society so undervalues education, during the school year, I work 60-70 hours a week.  Last night, I graded until 8:00 PM, on Friday night.  I woke up this morning and spent three more hours grading, recording, and uploading files.  As soon as I finish this post, I’ll spend at least five to six more hours doing the same.  Tomorrow, I’ll spend all day grading.  From mid-August to mid-December, I get maybe three or four full days off.  Anyone who has ever taught can attest that being in the classroom teaching is exhausting work in and of itself.  I’ve worked other jobs and have often said that one hour in class equates to about two hours at another job.  During the school year, I and every other teacher I know live in a constant state of exhaustion.

Because I have to work so many long hours with so little time off, I have no time or energy left over for loved ones.  Just talking to my children for an hour four nights a week is taxing.  Forget about date nights (not that I have any money for one) or spending quality time with friends and family.  Forget about writing or doing the things I need to do for the farm.  By the time I accomplish everything I have to do for school, I’m utterly spent, and it’s Monday morning and time to start over again.  Forget about promoting my books the way I need to.  Forget about nurturing a relationship.  Forget about having any kind of a normal life.

I’ve had well-intending people tell me to find another profession, as if the answer is so simple.  I’m trained to teach and write.  I’ve yet to find an employer out there that values my skills or equates them to their needs.  Not that there are any decent jobs out there right now.  I feel trapped by circumstances with no foreseeable end to the cycle.  I’ve all but lost hope on my books ever being “successful” financially.  I’ve all but lost hope on ever getting the farm off the ground, even though I’ve proven my hydro design works.  I simply don’t have the funds to make it happen.

So each day, I feel a little more bitter, a little more angry.  I feel like our system has failed me at each and every turn.  I’m trying desperately to find something to give me a glimmer of hope, a flicker of optimism that somehow things will get better, but each day I feel more trapped, more alone, more forsaken, more disenfranchised.  That’s my reality.  That’s where I am right now.