I was looking at a Jewish Observer magazine from the 1980s and noticed an article about an impending crisis: the shortage of rebbeim. It struck me that the issues being raised then are the same ones we keep hearing about now. Quality teachers are the most important part of school, and we always fear that the next generation of children won’t have teachers. The main argument is that we don’t pay enough. As a teacher, I wholeheartedly agree. However, if I start talking financials, this magazine – and the community – will devolve into arguments about transparency, accountability, pensions, and tuition. I’m not going there. Instead, I’d like to explore what teachers, administrators, and parents can do, aside from giving more money, to help make sure we have teachers who can and want to teach.
Recently, I got a beautiful email from a former student thanking me for being a part of her decision to go into chinuch. As I recall, when she returned from seminary, I discouraged her from doing this at every opportunity, for all the reasons we know well: low salary, poor job security, impossible expectations, high stress, the negative impact on shidduchim and work/life balance were some of the reasons I mentioned. Yet this student was a born teacher and smiled at my list of cons. She had probably been playing school with her stuffed animals from the time she could talk. My rational arguments would scare off many people but not a born teacher.
I do take some credit for her decision to go into teaching. When she was in my classroom, part of what I was teaching was how and why to teach. As I taught a Rashi, I explained why I wrote the vocabulary in one color and the questions in another. I showed my students how to put homework in the same spot every day. I taught the students about differentiation and metacognition. I also purposely shared my excitement about the privilege of teaching Torah.
Finding and Making Good Teachers
All professions try to attract the best and the brightest – to identify top talent and give them scholarships before they go elsewhere. As a teacher, I have the advantage of 12-plus years to recruit and encourage the best to join the ranks. I know who in the class has a natural talent. They are the ones who explain a concept when the classroom teacher can’t. At the end of the year, teachers often get thank you notes from students. Born teachers will comment on your technique: “You always made the lessons clear,” or “You organized the class and helped us.” They are also the ones who will criticize teachers very specifically: They’ll say “Mr. Smith’s homework doesn’t cover everything we learned today,” rather than “I don’t understand anything he says.” If a student can spot it, they’ve got it.
How can teachers encourage such budding teachers?
First, be excited and clear as to why it is a zechus, a privilege to teach. If we don’t share how special it is, they may not hear it elsewhere.
Second, minimize the kvetching. No one wants to grow up to be the person with a sour face and a perpetually annoyed attitude. If that’s you in school, do some self-care and think about where and how to work out frustrations other than in the classroom.
Third, teach how to teach to your captive audience. If students have a chance to learn about the art and science of teaching while they are in school, and are able to practice, they may decide to continue. When I was in elementary school, my teachers allowed me to share a dvar Torah from the Midrash Says weekly. I never stopped teaching even though I have tried. Incorporate teaching about teaching into your material, just as you talk about how you are baking when you bake with your kids.
Fourth, take your job seriously. Grade papers, monitor the class, and plan your lessons. We don’t teach to fill the day or get a tuition break. It’s an important job that requires work and effort. If you take teaching seriously, it will be held in higher esteem.
Finally, make a decision to share and build young teachers. A few years ago, I had a job in a public school district. My supervisor told me that the district took pride in how many of their teachers became administrators elsewhere. Every teacher and administrator I met shared and tried to help me. I grew considerably in both my confidence and abilities. If you are a seasoned teacher, give of yourself. Be available for young teachers and make it safe to experiment and learn around you. Share what you have done and created. Many years ago, I decided to put my curriculum and materials on chinuch.org for free. It was hard because I had put so many hours into that work. My concerns seem trivial now. How much money could I make realistically from selling my work? A few hundred dollars? A few thousand if I became super-popular? I am not a business woman, and the materials would be gathering dust on my hard drive until today. Instead, in addition to Olam Haba, I gained immeasurably in terms of new relationships, new opportunities, and helpful feedback.
It’s Not All about Money
What can administrators do to attract teachers if they can’t raise salaries? I have had many supervisors over the years. One supervisor said to me, “Judaic studies teachers are a dime-a-dozen.” Her phrasing wasn’t what was painful. Rather, that phrase clarified what had been making me uncomfortable all year. I realized that this was her unspoken attitude in her interactions with her faculty. She was sure someone better would come along so she didn’t need to invest in me. I was ready to sacrifice a lot to be a teacher, but that attitude dispelled a lot of my idealism fast.
I have had other supervisors who treated me like one-in-a-million. Their respect went a long way to making the monetary sacrifice doable. Giving me luncheons, bagels, or cute gifts were not necessary. Rather, they genuinely and sincerely cared about me and my growth.
All administrators need to think, “Am I treating potential recruits and current teachers like a dime-a-dozen or one-in-a-million?” I know a young lady in a different city who applied for a teaching job. They didn’t return her calls, couldn’t finalize their decision, and made it clear they were waiting to hire a young woman who had less experience, less education, but more prominent yichus. That young lady went elsewhere.
Schools also need to pay attention to turnover. When a teacher leaves the system, it’s very expensive to replace her. It is also demoralizing as it perpetuates the message that chinuch is a short-term job with little security. Is the problem only that the young teachers move to Lakewood after getting married? Or are there other factors that make teachers leave? What is the turnover for teachers between the ages of 23 and 55?
The Role of Parents
What can parents do? Here I tread carefully. As parents, we are our child’s best advocates and need to watch out for them. We must be fearless and proactive. We also need to chill – a lot! – and bring down the intensity level around most school issues.
About 20 years ago, our community started to talk about what was causing children to go off-the-derech and how schools were contributing. The positive result is that our schools are now trying to reach all students in a positive and respectful way. They have realized that shaming, labeling and disrespect is harmful. The downside is that it is now socially acceptable to make teachers the scapegoats for complex issues. In popular Jewish media and casual conversations, we tell teacher horror stories: how a teacher made an insensitive comment and the child rejected everything to do with Yiddishkeit; how we had a terrible experience in school and don’t want our children to experience what we did again. The ratio of negative to positive teacher stories would make you think that all teachers are budding psychopaths. If that is the cultural message we are sending, why would anyone want to become a teacher?
It is true that the impact of a teacher lasts a lifetime. However, it takes more damage than we currently allow for our children to be irrevocably harmed. No, the rebbe’s homework policy is not what is causing children to go off the derech. That comment the teacher made was painful and a mistake, but your child will be okay if the general atmosphere is respectful. Our hypervigilance, criticism, drama, and anxiety are more likely to harm our children than what the teacher is doing. It also makes it challenging for imperfect but solid teachers to join or stay in the classroom.
As parents we have all survived childhood, some more intact than others. All of us have moments of shame from our school experiences that still bother us. But being an adult means putting our stories into a broader context rather than looking at them through the eyes of a child. When our children have painful stories in school, we need to advocate and problem solve but not react with the intensity of our own childhood experiences. When we catastrophize situations, we end up with nobody wanting to work for us.
Teachers Deserve our Respect
I was talking about this topic with an acquaintance from the chasidishe community. She told me that rebbeim and moros are held in high esteem. Chabad shluchot (emissary wives) around the world probably feel bad for those who are stuck in a comfortable office with easy access to kosher food and family. They know how valuable their work is. In the rest of the Jewish world, whether we are teachers, administrators, and parents, we need to think how to raise the esteem and respect for those who are teaching.
A living wage is important, and not every young women who wants to teach can do so right now. But if we identify and nurture born teachers, if we stop the scapegoating and start promoting the value of teaching, eventually, at a different stage of life, born teachers will find their way to the classroom and contribute their gifts. Lo alman Yisrael – the Jewish nation is not bereft. When things seem impossible, Hashem is working things out. We as a community, as teachers and administrators, need to contribute what we can to making sure our children have the best role models and guides as possible.
