They don’t even call us “teachers” anymore. We’re just “staff.”
That’s what the email said — “All staff must complete the digital compliance module by Friday.”
No “Dear educators.”
No “Thank you for your service.”
Just a deadline. A task. Like we’re part of a factory line.
I sat there staring at the screen, blinking behind my reading glasses, and for a moment, I swear I could still hear chalk scratching across the old greenboard in Room 203.
I started teaching high school English in 1981. Back then, the copy machine made a sound like it was coughing up a lung, and if you needed a bathroom break during 5th period, you had to trade classroom coverage with Mr. Heller from down the hall. We didn’t have Chromebooks. We had red pens, dog-eared novels, and the smell of teenage body spray lingering in the halls after lunch.
We also had respect.
Parents used to shake our hands at conferences, even when their kid was failing. “I know you’re doing your best with him, Ms. Turner,” they’d say, sometimes with a sigh, but never with blame.
Now, it’s emails at midnight — accusatory, cold:
“Why did my son get a C on this paper? Please explain.”
No hello. No context. No trust.
I’m 67 now. Still teaching. Not because I want to. Because I have to.
My pension doesn’t cover the rising cost of groceries. My husband passed in 2015, and the medical bills swallowed what savings we had. I tutor after hours. I grade papers at night with a space heater at my feet, wearing gloves because the school’s boiler doesn’t heat our wing properly anymore.
The kids don’t see it. Most of them are good, at heart. They laugh too loud, they forget their essays, they fight sleep in 8:00 AM algebra. But they still smile. Still say “hi” when they see me at Walmart. Some even come back after graduation — those are the moments that keep me going.
But this job isn’t what it was.
They installed “smart boards” last fall. Took down the bookshelves in the back and replaced them with VR headsets and “flexible learning pods.” I remember running my hand over the empty wooden shelves, still marked by tape where we used to label the classics — To Kill a Mockingbird, Of Mice and Men, The Scarlet Letter. The librarian, Mrs. Chen, cried in the breakroom after they made her box them all up.
We used to teach stories. Now we teach “modules.”
We used to mentor. Now we manage behavior data.
We used to raise children. Now we’re expected to “raise test scores.”
The hardest part? The loneliness.
You’d think after 40 years in the same building, I’d feel at home. But the new teachers stick together — young, bright-eyed, trained on tablets and lesson planning software. They smile politely when I mention paper rubrics or reading aloud. But I know they think I’m a dinosaur.
They don’t ask me for advice. And I’ve stopped offering.
Once, a boy had a panic attack in class. I sat with him on the hallway floor, held his hand, and helped him breathe. Another teacher walked by, glanced down, and said, “Did you log it in the student portal yet?”
That’s what we’ve become — data collectors. Not caretakers. Not mentors. Just another cog in the system.
I remember the first time I cried in a classroom.
It was 1983. The district had just announced budget cuts, and our arts program was on the chopping block. I stood in front of my juniors, trying to read The Crucible, but the words wouldn’t come. One of my students — tall, awkward Jamie with a stutter — came up, took the book from my hands, and read it aloud for the rest of class.
He’s a lawyer now. Sent me a Christmas card last year.
Moments like that… they’re why I stayed. Not the salary. Not the standardized tests. But the glimpses of growth, of grit, of goodness.
That part hasn’t changed. Not completely.
But everything else? Feels like we’ve been erased.
Teaching used to be noble. Now it feels disposable.
Politicians who’ve never stepped foot in a classroom tell us how to do our jobs. Parents blame us when the WiFi goes down or the app crashes. The district rolls out new programs every year, always “data-driven,” always “cost-saving,” but never human.
And the kids… they’re anxious. Lost. Always connected, but starved for connection.
Some come to school hungry. Some wear the same hoodie for two weeks. Some don’t speak at all. I try to notice. Try to be that one steady adult in their lives. But I’m tired. My knees ache. My memory slips sometimes.
And I worry: when I’m gone, who will stay for them?
I’m not bitter. I’m heartbroken.
Not just for myself — but for the profession I loved. For the version of education that raised thinkers, not test-takers. For the generations who came through my room and found a voice, a safe place, a second chance.
Now we talk about “outputs,” not journeys.
Now it’s all “compliance,” “efficiency,” “scalability.”
But you can’t measure a teenager’s growth on a spreadsheet. You can’t quantify what it means when a shy girl reads her poem aloud for the first time. Or when a boy who used to skip class shows up every day because he feels seen.
You can’t replace that with a tablet.
Sometimes, in the quiet before first bell, I sit at my desk with a thermos of lukewarm coffee and flip through old yearbooks.
I see their faces — kids from 1987, 1999, 2006 — frozen in smiles, in braces, in bad haircuts and borrowed tuxedos. And I remember.
They wrote me notes. “Thank you for believing in me.” “You were the only one who listened.”
I keep those notes in a drawer. The tech department wanted to take my filing cabinet last year, said we were “digitizing records.” I refused.
Some memories don’t belong in the cloud.
People ask why I don’t retire.
Sometimes I ask myself that too.
But then a girl lingers after class to say her mom just got diagnosed.
Or a boy hands me a crumpled essay and says, “It’s not great, but I tried.”
Or a former student drops by with their own child in tow, and suddenly I’m “Ms. Turner” again, not “staff.”
And I think: this is why.
Not for the paycheck. Not for the emails.
But for the small, quiet moments that still feel like magic.
So if you see a teacher — really see them — don’t just ask about lesson plans or summer breaks.
Ask how their heart is.
Ask what they’ve had to give up to stay.
Ask what they’ve carried that no one else will see.
We’re still here. Some of us, just barely.
But we’re still trying.
Even if the world has forgotten what we were called.
Not “staff.”
Not “compliance workers.”
Not “content deliverers.”
We are teachers.
And we remember.
Even if no one else does.
There was blood on the desk.
Just a small smear, barely noticeable unless you were looking for it.
Seat 14B. Third row from the front, second desk from the right.
That’s where Eric used to sit.
He hadn’t been in school for a week.
At first, we were told it was a flu. Then came whispers — not from administration, but from kids, in the cafeteria line and locker hallways. Something about his stepdad. About a bottle. About the ambulance that came at 2 a.m.
No official announcement. No counselor check-ins. Just an empty desk and a sticky note on my door that said, “Be sure to post grades by 3 PM.”
It was January, bitter cold outside. The kind of cold that clings to your skin even after you come in from the wind. I stood in front of my class and tried to explain verb tenses while that desk stared back at me like a wound.
That day, I broke.
I went home and cried in the car. Not because of Eric, not only. But because I realized I had no one left to talk to about these things.
Used to be we had a lounge. Not a “collaboration zone” or a silent nook with ergonomic stools. A real lounge. With coffee so burnt it was practically tar, and a couch with springs sticking out. We’d sit there during planning periods, trade stories, vent, laugh, cry if we needed.
Now? We sip from personal thermoses, alone at our screens.
They call it “streamlining.” I call it isolation.
The world changed. I didn’t.
I still print out attendance sheets and mark them by hand. I still bring home essays with coffee stains. I still keep extra granola bars in my drawer, because someone always forgets breakfast.
But sometimes I wonder… am I just pretending this job still matters?
Last week, a new administrator walked into my room during 6th period. No knock. Just walked in, tablet in hand, making notes as I read aloud from Of Mice and Men. After class, she pulled me aside.
“We’re encouraging a more interactive, tech-integrated format,” she said. “This approach is a little… dated.”
I nodded. I always nod now.
But later, as I wiped the board clean, I felt something inside me start to go quiet. Like a radio station slowly losing signal.
