Why do DCPS Teachers Leave?

I'm sorry that you are having a hard time. However, can you step back and see how arrogant you (likely) were when you started just a few weeks ago? DCPS attracts/recruits urban teaching 'veterans' who assume that they can do what DCPS teachers cannot accomplish. It drives me nuts. Every year I see you all start the year with smug attitudes and then bail. Turns out that this is a tough as hell place to teach.

This is my first year teaching ever. I wasn't smug at all. I didn't assume much. I wanted to teach here, because I grew up here. I received a crappy education. My teachers used to turn on a video and walk out of the room. I wasn't prepared for college. Somehow I made it anyway. I wanted to help people who look like me see a world outside of the bubble that they know. I'm not leaving because it's "tough as hell." This place is hell.

I'm leaving because in the first week one teacher had his arm dislocated by a student while another suffered a broken hand. They threatened to rape a female teacher after work. One of my students was arrested in my classroom for fighting another student for "looking at him." That same day, another student was beaten unconscious in the classroom next door. The students intentionally threw laptops from the laptop cart to the ground, shattering them, because they "didn't feel like reading." All of these students are still enrolled. At most they received a two or three day suspension and returned with new shoes, new hairdos, and a new lore among their peers.

They sit in the classes on their phones, they gamble, they throw chairs and flip over tables in what our administration writes off as "attention seeking behavior" and all throughout this someone comes in to informally observe us and tell us how shitty of a job we're doing. They don't suspend or expel, because the goal is to reduce suspension numbers this year. I call parents everyday and, while a FEW apologize and say that they'll try to speak with their kids, the majority say something along the lines of "that's your problem," "I've washed my hands of my child," or "don't call me again."

My evaluation is based on their test scores, but 90% of my students are five or six years below grade level. They're working on learning basic subtraction in 10th grade Math. I don't fault them for that. The system failed them, but you can't put 28 of them in one class with one teacher and with these behaviors and expect any actual learning to occur. I have 34 in some classes despite union rules and the most I get is a stipend because it violates the agreement. I technically get a planning period each day, but I have meetings or am told to cover someone else's class 3-4 times a week. I leave the building around 5 after all of our after school meetings, then pick up my child. By the time I get home, it's after six. After my child is fed, then I get to grading and filling out paperwork for 215 kids. Then, I work on my lesson which is essentially a 90 minute presentation every single day.

Please don't lessen the experience by making it seem like we're just in a funk about kids who may be a little talkative.