All across South Africa this morning, schools were buzzing with activity as teachers returned to school in preparation for the new academic year. It is always a special atmosphere on this first day, and although there are always those who have to tell you that the holiday was too short, the majority of staff are genuinely happy to be back. For those who have never experienced this, the first hour of this day is usually loud, there are lots of hugs and often there are more questions asked in that hour than in a Grade R classroom on cake sale day!
However, for many educators, this first hour masks the anxiety and stress they are already feeling about the upcoming year. It is a sad reality that globally we are seeing exorbitant rates of mental health distress among our school workers, with some studies showing that more than 75% of teachers have reported experiencing work-related stress levels that compromise their health. To put this in perspective – the average percentage across all working professionals is around 40%. We have a crisis in education and it is one that we will not be able to solve unless we start giving ourselves some grace.
As I write this, I know that the advice I am going to give is somewhat hypocritical. For so many years I was that teacher who was at school at 6:30am and was often the last car in the car park in the evening, but perhaps this gives me a unique insight into how we as teachers can take control of our own stress levels, and safeguard our mental health. There are a few things I have recommended to young teachers over the years, which I wish had been shared with me early on. I will explore these during the course of the year but today I will share with you the two most important ones, and I hope it inspires some of you for the 2024 year.
1. Guard your time.
It is inevitable that your personal cellphone number will be shared at some stage. We have come full circle since the days that teachers didn’t even list their home phone numbers in the phone book. While people have greater access to us these days we can still control how we handle this. You are not obliged to answer messages, calls and emails in the evenings. You time outside of school and on weekends is vital for you to rest and recharge. A rested teacher is a teacher that can handle the stress that comes with the job. You may have some resistance initially from colleagues and parents who feel that they are entitled to your attention at all hours of the day and night. There is a relatively simple cure for this – your return message, email or call the next day needs to include the words “Thank you for your call/email/text last night. However, please note that I devote this time to my own family, hence me replying now during my working hours”.
I cannot stress the importance of this enough. While a school leader, every single year I noticed a very strong correlation between staff who were feeling overwhelmed, and the access they allowed people to have to them outside of school hours.
2. Give yourself grace.
One of the most cringe-worthy questions I know every teacher gets is “why did you want to be a teacher?”. I once heard a fellow student (at the time) reply quite honestly “because of the school holidays”. Kudos to him for his honesty, but I don’t think he made it past 1st year. The fairly standard answer given the empathetic nature of most teachers is “I want to make a difference in someone’s life”. While this is a noble pursuit and one almost all teachers achieve in some way or another, the problem comes when we start losing sight of making a difference in one person’s life, to thinking we have to make a difference in every single learner’s life. Far too many teachers I see dealing with extreme cases of stress have fallen into this trap of believing that they are the only contributing factor to a child’s success and they allow this pressure to consume them.
I leave you today with the words I left my colleagues with at the end of last year, by Ralph Waldo Emerson, in the quote below. As teachers we owe it to ourselves, our families and our schools to redefine our thinking around success. So often we tell our children that as long as they have done their best, then that is good enough – they have succeeded – while we rarely grant ourselves this grace.
Let 2024 be the year that you give yourself some grace.