I am feeling pretty detached at the moment. Figure I would use this space to think aloud.
I have been fighting with admin at my school for proper support for me as a teacher and for help fixing a broken program for my students. I got laid off effective the end of the school year. Think it might be because I was a pain in the ass, but I don’t know for sure. I wasn’t doing a great job because they overloaded me. More different classes than most teachers. Shit support.
Covid money ran out, they had to lay off some of the conditionally certified teachers and I was one of them. The timing was just… all my complaints, I they were making me cover a position that was vacant while doing my regular teaching, and the students were missing out. I don’t think I could prove it but it feels like they got rid of me because I was not satisfied with their answers.
I can’t bring myself to finish getting my teacher certification. I’d have to go out of county to teach.
I worked 10 years with the homeless, burnt out and fucked it up. Then 2 years working for a law firm supposedly helping people and figure out its just bullshit, helping people was incidental and barely helped. Worked for the cops supposedly helping addicts in person, they just wanted me to do data entry. No idea what I should do.
It took a lot of courage to get myself to try being a teacher. 3 years at the schools and now I fucking again have to figure out what to do all over again.
And I have to go into the school for over a month and pretend everything is okay. Fuck I hate this.
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FWIW I burned out of my job and got a job at a grocery store that isn’t terrible and that idgaf about. I punch in, do my job, whatever they want I don’t care. It’s stupid dumb easy work, punch out and go home. No stress. No emotional labor. Decent physical work.
Anything fulfilling/exciting is done for me on my time for my (and/or others) benefit.
Capitalism gonna capitalism, so I’m exploiting my job as much as I can since I’m just being exploited. I don’t fucking care about my job, or the company I work for. I’m there to get paid and get the fuck out.
Maybe consider going into the trades. A two year apprentice electrician is probably making about the same as you were as a teacher. You are obviously smart enough to get through higher education, so materially, its easy to learn considering the base education level required (usually high school or less). Any one competent will rise rapidly through any company (quite literally show up on time and not be too high). Get your journeyman (5 years/ 10k hours, and guess what you get paid the whole time) and in most states you’ll be making 6 figures plus. Plus significant overtime for anything over 40.
You can take all that extra time you don’t have to put into classroom prep and do something socially good with it.
I mean if you are looking for excitement… Maybe snake charmer?
Otherwise it doesn’t seem like you are in a position to find happiness through your employment. It hasn’t exactly ‘worked out’ so far, so maybe you should figure out why you are unhappy and then work backwards to what you want to spend your time doing. Like if being unhappy is what you enjoy, that’s fine too, but be real with yourself. It sounds like you’ve driven head first into a couple walls at this point, and when alternative advice comes around your like “but that wont make me happy”, well bro/sis/sib, neither did any of your other approaches. Maybe try something where you don’t actually know what the outcome will be.
Schools are really tough right now. A teacher friend was in an inpatient psych unit for a month and said a fourth of the people there were in education. Apply at another district now so you can have a job in the fall if you want it. Every district is different and the mood always changes year to year with staff changes. Spend your summer looking at different options and decide in August.
Won’t lie I’ve fantasized about going inpatient just to get a break…
I was thinking about you today. Everyone at one of my schools is fighting. My own building is in a clusterfuck of stupidity and total lack of communication. I hope you had a good day. 16 more wakeups for me! How many do you have?
Sucks. Communication? Nah, 13 days until seniors are gone.
Our new special ed director proposes big changes for next year, but only gives partial info, which just leaves everyone stressed. We’re losing a shitload of people and we’re already shorthanded. 13 days - You can do it!!
I’ve joked about voluntarily being involuntarily committed.
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I started programming at 41 and it’s been about 5 years. Was an elementary school teacher before and it was a VERY DIFFICULT transition. I still suck but hanging in there. If my dumbass can do it you can too! I’m rooting for u
I’ve wanted to learn programming for a while to make a game that I have in mind But every time I’ve tried to make myself sit down and start learning I suck at it. It just doesn’t seem to come Intuitively to me at all.
Dude I still suck. But u get used to couple of languages and if u can follow data being passed around u r golden. Don’t give up!
What language?
Aguilar (type script), c# and tsql for the database. I suck at all three
Burnout happens when emotionally taxing work goes unrewarded and/or doesnt feel impactful. And unfortunately you seem to have picked jobs that require a lot of emotional labor and altruism that dont feel impactful or rewarded. Which is par for the course and one of the main reasons why our education and health systems aren’t doing so great at retaining people.
What you are probably going to want to do is move away from those types of jobs. At least for a while so you can recover. And if you absolutely need to do something like what youve done before eg. teaching, you may want to look into freelance part time tutoring instead. Something you can do when you feel like being helpful but walk away from when you need to. Then pick a main job that isn’t in the same areas you have been working.
Electrician or plumbing. You’ll make money, and you’ll help people not burn down or flood their house.
Solid jobs. Robot and AI resistant. Necessary and people will pay well for your work which they can’t do without, particularly plumbing.
I’ve advised plenty of students to go doing that path for basicaly the same reasons the other posters said. I’m not above that sort of work, I just don’t know, it just doesn’t seem appealing to me.
Honestly the work is pretty fun. I’d do it if I was physically able. It can be hard but it’s never boring. If you like working with people though then yeah you probably won’t like it unless you work on big jobs.
When I got laid off in 2009, I went to China. Not the same conditions now but I took my design experience and worked for some hiring agencies. It’s how I discovered Industrial Design, came back to states and went back to college for it.
Maybe some expat position in another country could work for you if you don’t have a family to care for. It can dramatically lower your cost of living, give you a break from the usual education jobs and give you time to decide on a new career to come home to.
I would love to try something like that, but I got a 3 and 5 year old. Not in the cards.
Rooting for you
Thanks
You could try moving to another city in another state. The difference in pay (and support) for teachers is crazy.
As much as I don’t like cops, JFC do they get nice pay and benefits in my state- like from the start. I doubt my city is very dangerous, and the prerequisites are almost nothing. Also, it would be nice to have more decent cops.
Otherwise, I work in software as a manager. Not the easiest gig, but not the hardes, and you can probably get your foot in the door at a lower level if you can work spreadsheets, have patience, and mildly thick skin. Pretty good pay.
Also, ironically school admin positions pay well.
It sounds like you have a degree, so there’s lots of options. Otherwise, as mentioned, the trades are always calling if you can stomach early hours.
Someone said trades and I would agree. But to add a layer to that, consider working in local government public works. If you care about having an impact, it’s a way of seeing the work you do directly positively affecting your community. Once you get a couple years in, it’s steadier than the private sector trades and there’s (depending on where you go) more options for union support and health care as your body ages.
Helping the elderly. There’s always a need.
And if you get a degree like nursing or social work, the pay improves. Have a friend who had trouble holding down jobs. Landed on nursing and is one of the few male nurses in his rural county. Is on contract and goes to different places, as needed.
Seconding local government!! It comprises a huge variety of jobs, more than most people ever imagine. And it’s work that really does matter in the community, so it scratches that altruism itch with much less emotional involvement. While the pay isn’t always great, it tends to have good benefits. I’m my experience it’s great for people who are jacks-of-all-trades as opposed to specialized. You’ll invariably have to be trained on the job, so your resourcefulness and diverse skillset will matter a lot more than any expertise in a specific domain.
