Throw out all of the political drama my district is currently going through, the occasional wacky parent, a handful of disruptive kids, and the low pay – I love my job. Interacting with a 150 kids a day, discussing topics that I find interesting, developing curriculum, getting to read more about these topics, and getting to guide my own curriculum make me want to keep coming to work. You’ll notice grading is not on that list. Grading is the part of the job that I actually despise at times. I know evaluation is one of the keys of education and do my best to make sure that I give my students a fair shake, but when I collect a big project or an set of essays, a feeling of dread circles over my head and doesn’t disappear until I have finished.
I just finished grading 109 AP World History essays on the Haitian Revolution in the last week. This set easily took me 25 hours to finish. I usually take 2-3 weeks to get back essays, but I wanted them done well before the grading period ends next week. This is on top of writing a couple lectures (2-3 hours) and revising a lesson for my AP class. I have friends who have said it must be nice to be done with work at 2:30. But, as my wife will attest to, I am always working. I always have a paper to grade, a lesson to work on, a meeting to attend, or a book to read. When I have nothing to do for tomorrow, I think about the next day or even the next school year. Something always needs revising.
Then there is all that time off in the summer. Yeah right.
Anyone else ever get comments that teachers “have it easy”?
danmcdowell.net 