Best Way to Decide Whether to Stay in a Teaching Profession

The best reason to stay in teaching is because you are passionate about your job and gain real satisfaction out of what you do. The worst reason is because of the salary.

Many teachers stay in the profession for a long time, and some become embittered and cynical, which shows in their teaching. Younger teachers often burn themselves out by taking on too much or finding it hard to deal with the workload pressures.

There are hundreds of different reasons why you might want to jack it all in and never look back. However, if you don’t want to end up becoming another teaching ‘drop out’ statistic, the following checklist should help you decide if you should stay put and stick it out, or get out while you can. If you can answer an honest ‘yes’ to more than three of these questions, it might be time to consider a change.

•   Do you feel constantly tired, anxious or stressed while you are at work, and honestly believe this is due to your job?
•   Are you struggling to keep up with the workload pressures and feel you cannot cope with what is expected of you?
•   Have you found yourself treating students differently, perhaps being unnecessarily stern or aggressive without good cause?
•   Have you become disillusioned with the education system, cur­riculum requirements or even just teaching in general?
•    Do you feel you would be better suited to employment elsewhere, preferably out of the education sector?
•    Is your salary the only reason you stay in your job?
•    Do you find that you spend more time concentrating on the neg­ative sides to the job than enjoying it?
•   Do you feel your job is having a negative impact on your home and/or family life, or has taken over your life too much?
•    Has your GP prescribed you medication, or have you turned to any drugs or stimulants to help you ‘cope’ with the stresses of your job?
•   Is it the case that when you are asked to list the things you enjoy about your job, you honestly can’t think of any?

This checklist makes teaching look bleak and disheartening, but it is important to remember that the profession doesn’t have to be like that. You may find that a change of school is the best thing for you, or perhaps you just need to take a short break for a while to reassess your career.