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[quote=Anonymous]Agree with much of the previous.

I have a degree from MIT and was a high school teacher for 5 years.  I loved teaching high school. Seven years ago, I left, went to grad school and I'm now a professor. I still miss the energy of high school and that age group.

I didn't leave because of the bad pay, but it didn't help. Some of the reasons I left were:

1. The school I taught at was falling down, there were never enough books or chairs or desks or whiteboard markers or kleenex. It seemed as though no one cared that the students were being denied basic things (functioning bathrooms).  It was a slap every time I submitted a FORM asking for a box of kleenex and was told I had reached my quota for the month. Sometimes, it's the small things.

2.  The testing. The standards. I was an expert in my content area and am even more so now. The multiple choice exams weren't measuring anything I would consider important. The standards were unreasonable, ensured that I couldn't meet my students needs, and couldn't improvise or do any fun projects, etc.

3. Class sizes. I was in California. I had over 40 kids in most classes and 7 classes per day. If you have just a few disruptive kids per class, it gets crazy. They were packed in like sardines. For our giant school we had only a few counselors and admins - we needed double the number we had.

4. The hours. The grading alone killed me. I don't remember a weekend or holiday I didn't work. Grading, lesson planning, meeting with parents, meeting with admins, helping students after school.... it all adds up. I shouldn't have to wreck my life and be some sort of martyr just to get my job done. My relationships suffered, I was eating out too much, and not exercising.

5. I was sick of hearing how teaching is a bad profession. I was sick of hearing parents say, "Oh my god, you went to MIT? Why are you here?" I was tired of getting told how teachers are lazy and bad at their jobs.

Basically, I feel like everyone loves to complain about how horrible public education is. In the end, one thing that would help fix schools is money. Reduce class sizes and work loads to reasonable amounts. Hire some more counselors and support staff for the kids that need help. Fix the infrastructure. Pay teachers more. Then, start giving them some respect. Sadly, no one is going to put their money where their mouth is. They're just going to keep bitching about lazy, dumb teachers .

When I look at teaching now, I wonder how it would feel to be held accountable for ALL the problems that my students had. The focus on assessing teachers by student test scores seems insane to me. There were so many systemic issues I had no control over. 
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