Why I teach

I have a card on my desk that says "It's about the kids, stupid." I've had it since my second year of teaching, when a wise administrator told me, "This profession will eat you up if you don't have a reason to come in other than the pay check." I believe that everything that's wrong with education comes from the adult world. Bad manners, mandates, lawsuits and accountability models that measure business potentials, not the hearts and mind of growing children, all have their origins in what adults think. I walk in the door and do the job every day because of the kids. I am a teacher because Tyler wrote his first novel under my tutelage; Robert became the first in his family ever to go to college; and Jose, Marcus and Jessica all read well enough now to read stories to their own children. Would those things have happened without me? I don't know, but it's not a gamble I'm willing to take with your child. — Eva Belliston, Crescent View Middle School

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As another school year ends, teachers have the same frustrations, plus some new ones. They will all tell you that teaching is a much more difficult job than it was when they began. They clogged my e-mail with their frustrations. Some of the highlights:

The extra responsibilities that government keeps piling on them while never relieving them of any existing duties.

Government-mandated testing of students (and uniform test-score requirements), which consumes time that could be spent teaching and doesn't take into account kids with learning problems.

Budget and staff cuts that force teachers to perform jobs previously done by specialists, meaning they have to teach library, computer and second-language skills, as well as some resource kids.

Budgets that are so tight that teachers � who are not handsomely paid to begin with � are spending their own money on supplies.

The extra jobs many teachers are forced to take because of their meager salaries.

The extra duty that is required � committees, bus and playground duty, inservice . . .

The increased responsibilities that force them to do work at home while neglecting their own families.

The angry parents who think their child could do no wrong and it must be the teacher's fault.

Failing to give teachers a pay raise while also raising their medical premiums so that the net effect is they actually take a pay cut.

The parents who send their sick kids to school because they work and can't be home to baby-sit.

The demise of the home and family and the resulting poor behavior and morals among the students.

And yet teachers keep coming back for more.

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