First, hello to all the new subscribers and readers who found my blog via Freshly Pressed! I’m incredibly surprised at the amount of positive feedback the post has generated, and am honored to have been chosen by WordPress. While I do plan to write more “Geek Love” themed posts (There are always more horrifying and/or hilarious stories from when an academic decides to date, believe me.), my blog is not solely about dating while academic. It’s about my transition from student to teacher, and I mostly blog about my successes and failures during my first couple years of teaching freshmen composition. If you would like to get in contact, feel free to email me or follow me on Twitter.
I’ve been teaching freshmen comp for a little while now. Enough that I have a history on my campus. Meaning I’ve taught several classes of students, sending them off into the wild world of college without me to remind them of when assignments are due and where to put their apostrophes.
Initially, I thought teaching would be great for my personality, as someone who gets easily bored and needs near constant stimulation (Yes, I do realize that I sound like I’m a eight-year-old with a master’s degree.). I thought switching it up every semester with new students and a new classroom dynamic would be well, awesome. But now I find myself missing my former students. I haven’t seen many of them in awhile, and I’m wondering what’s happened to them.
I’m wondering if one of them started the business he was so excited about it. If the students who were still deciding to find a major finally picked one. I’m wondering if the ones who did are still on their path of choice to become doctors, accountants, and nurses. If the ones who rocked my class are still doing good in all their classes even though I’m no longer there to teach and guide them. I’m wondering if the student who told me she loved to write so much still writes in her journal every day. If I ran into her, I would ask her if she still likes to write given that she’s likely had to do a few challenging college writing assignments by now.
And it’s not just the “good” students that I want to see again. I want to stumble into the ones I knew hated my class and say, ”I’m a much better teacher now! Take my class again! I promise you’ll like it more this time!” I still worry about the ones who struggled through my course. I wonder if they’re having trouble in their other classes too. I wonder if they took my advice to get help through campus services or if they’re continuing to struggle or even worse, have given up and dropped out altogether.
I think about the one who was so bright, but hated college so much that he promised me he would drop out and join the armed forces before the next semester began. A little wishful part of me hopes to run into him on campus, that he changed his mind, but given his determination, I know he’s gone. I hope he’s happier, but that’s not enough for me. I want to know, that wherever he is, he’s happier.
And perhaps, most of all, I think of the students I never could reach. That were distant, unfocused, and disengaged throughout my course. The ones who were in my classroom, sometimes mere feet from me, but were never really there. I would tell them that I knew they were there and I tried hard, every day, to engage them in what we were doing. I want to let them know that I cared about them and how they’re doing, though they probably don’t think very much about me.
I’m having a hard time of letting go of my students. I know I sound like an ex that’s still hung up on someone she cares about and is desperately seeking that imaginary notion of “closure.” I hope I don’t sound too crazy. But I didn’t realize how attached I would become to my first few classes of students. And I’ve come to realize now, my job has become two-fold. I’m working on successfully getting my current students through my class, and letting the ones that have already done so, go.
So I ask the educators who are reading my post today, how do you let go?
This post is very refreshing and makes me think fondly back to all my teachers. It also reassures me as I am sure if I ever run into teachers there will be that disappointing moment where they forget who I was in their class. But you care and remember …and you don’t sound like a crazy person! If all teachers were as caring as you, the education process would be improved
Thanks for the reassurance! I was worried that I was sounding a little crazy. And don’t worry, I’m sure many of your teachers remember you fondly.
I must say, Laura, I really enjoy your style. No matter the subject. Keep at it.
Thank you. That’s really kind of you.
Awesome piece of writing. I couldn’t help myself laugh and agree on every sentence. Well, how I cope with it? I think I’m used to the idea that life itself is a bit like those classes: it’s the nature of leaving some people along the way, and unfortunately, not hear from them never ever again. So it’s not a super-big deal. But it’s sad.
It’s true. It’s not like I think about my former students every day, but I do wonder about them sometimes. It just saddens me that I won’t see some of them again.
I think that the care factor is what sets you apart from the rest. It is hard to let go and I have often wondered what my first class of Preschoolers would be like today, 7 years on.
Reflection on our teaching practice is a great thing and one of the practices that helps us become the teacher that students remember for all the right reasons!
You are not crazy, or maybe we both are. I don’t think even the age group factors in here as your students are college material and mine are collage material! They don’t call it humanities for nothing
Congratulations on being Freshly Pressed!
I love that you teach preschool! I know I wouldn’t have the patience and attention span for it! I would be just as bad as my students!
Love after class, why not?
Just a thought, but now with social media maybe it will be easier to stay connected with former students? I follow a few of my former marketing professors on Twitter and though we don’t necessarily converse all the time, it’s nice to know they’re out there and I could send them a note. And I think it’s awesome that you do care what your students are doing now; I often wonder if professors remember the classes and memorable groups of students like I do.
I do follow several students using social media (but usually because they found me first). Maybe I need to step that up and search for them instead, but I hope it wouldn’t look creepy to them that I found them on Facebook, Twitter, etc.!
This is a tough one! My only teaching experience lasted two months. The students felt I was too rough on them because I didn’t give multiple choice tests. I included some multiple choice but the entire test wasn’t that way. I do occasionally wonder if any of them are still practicing massage and if any of them went to work outside of small Day spas since I am biased about the difference between Resort and Destination Spas vs. Hair Salons that throw a massage room in the back closet and then call themselves a Day Spa! I hope some of them did go on to find out just how different Professional Spa work is from Cosmetology. I didn’t have a hard time letting go probabally because my time in the classroom was so short and ended with the students revolting because I was supposedly too hard on them. But I do remember the student who’s home was robbed the first week of class, the older woman who’s daughter was taking fencing lessons at U of Alabama, the young man who’s name made me think of Captain Kirk from Star Trek and the student who ran into me after I had left the school while I was working in a gas station! but I don’t cling. I have my own life to live and I have a nephew I fuss over.
Sorry your teaching experience didn’t go so great the first time. Maybe one day you can get back into it. Hopefully you’ll get a better group of students this time around!
Excellent post today. I really enjoyed it very much thanks!
Writers Wanted
I’m not sure I can offer advice, but I can empathize. This is my first year teaching 6th-8th grade choir, and whenever I see students who were in my class last semester wandering the halls, I desperately want to know how they’re doing. I have to consciously back off. It’s wonderful when they will walk up to me and say hello, but some, either our of anger for not being able to fit my class in their schedule, or out of sheer apathy or disinterest, walk by without acknowledging me. The way you described your students who were there but never “really there” makes me think of these students. How could they not know that I was planning each lesson with them in mind? Trying my best to involve them? I try not to take it too personally, but part of me still hopes that they’ll say hello in the halls, or mention that they miss my class, and in a perfect world, would sign up again. And now, I hope I don’t sound crazy!
Thanks for this post!
I relate to everything you’ve said. I’m trying not to take it too personally when the students who were never there, don’t ever contact me again. And I do think I need to back off a little and just let go. That’s why I haven’t searched for my students on social media or try to go to places I know where they would be. And I don’t think we sound too crazy! We sound like good teachers!
I teach in an elementary school, and I think that I take a little tiny bit of every single kid I teach when they move on, so I suppose I never truly let go of them. I remember at least one little thing about everyone I have ever taught, and I’ve been teaching for around 30 years! I have seen some of my former students (or their parents) years later, too, and I am always so touched that they remember me, so I guess the connection goes both ways in a lot of cases.
You remember one little thing about every kid? And you’re taught for 30 years? That’s amazing! I hope to be as good as teacher as you someday!
after 20+ years of teaching, i can easily say that one of the things that has caused me to retire is my students. my last 5 years was in an urban district with many economic and behavioral challenges that i haven’t seen anywhere else. the number of kids who i had never seen before, didn’t know, but would approach me for either food, money, or advice was amazing. the number of kids who would burst into my room in the middle of a class and say, “you got any snacks?” and i’d say, “it isn’t halloween.” and they’d walk out saying either “forget you” or “fuck you” was absurd.
the number of kids who would come to school bruised in the face from a parental punch was disturbing. kids who missed the bus and begged for a ride because of the bad neighborhoods to walk through were saddening.
the number of kids who would have easily come home with me because their homes were so depressing was….depressing.
an attachment to students will drain on your sympathies to an unhealthy degree. i hate to say that you have to try to not care, but caring will be a double edged sword that will bring you well up and well down at the same time.
Wow, while your story shocks me, it sounds very familiar to many of my friends who teach in secondary public schools. It’s sad to me, but I’m sure after dealing with it for so long, I would have different feelings like you did.
i don’t regret the emotional involvement or attachment. it helped those kids, but it drained on me. maybe that’s the sacrifice we make, and that makes it okay. when you stick your foot out, you sometimes get stepped on, but you still take a step – as opposed to just standing there.
ooh. i like that!
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Thanks for sharing your stories (I made a similar leap several years ago!) and your insights on education. I’ve given Red Lips and Academics The Versatile Blogger Award and hope more people will check out your blog – I love it! http://frifflethoughts.blogspot.com/2012/01/blush-awards-are-so-much-fun-blush.html
I don’t let go of them. Every one of my students (in the whopping three years I’ve been teaching comp) has changed not only how I teach, but how I think about my world, and my relationship to it. These relationships that we develop with our students, they are mostly transitory, but it’s not the continuation of contact that’s rewarding, it’s the intensity of it, the privilege of guiding a kid through what can so often be such a personally formative and fulfilling class. I’ve written a couple of rec’s (one of my kids is a nursing student at John’s Hopkins now!) but overall my after-class keeping up has been real limited. All the same, those people, those interactions, are some of the most lastingly important of my life so far. Don’t think of the changes in cast as a loss, but as a process of accumulation.
That was beautifully written. Thanks for sharing.
I love your blog and empathize with you entirely on the dating realm of academics. I am a recent biology graduate and struggle with the simplest male interactions because of my over analyzing self. Please check out my blog sometime it is about my strife (not in dating I left that to you) dealing with the MCAT and seeing where to go after graduation, and if I get accepted into Oxford to minor in english. I also relate my life to science equations at times. Albeit not as an enthralling read as redlipsandacedemics a good read none the less. http://www.academicorchid.com
I find this refreshing. I’ve taken so many classes with so many teachers that seemed like they didn’t care. I think its nice that you become attached to your students.
It means you care how your knowledge impacts them. Great post!
As a therapist, I can identify with the themes of teaching and letting go. I work with a very unstable, often transient population, and so I often don’t know how long I’ll have to work with a client. This forces me to sharpen my focus to each individual session, as that may be all the time I get. When clients leave “early” or without warning, and even when the ending of therapy is planned, I always go back to this question: “Did I manage to teach this person tools that she didn’t have before?” If I can answer yes to that question, then I can let go.
Thanks for the post, I look forward to more.
While you are all at it (not a teacher yet, so can’t give my 5 cents), maybe someone could tell me, how do you let go of professors after graduating?
Thank you so much for this post! This reminds me of a similar experience I recently had while working at the middle school I attended. I just recently returned from teaching in Australia, was struggling with a lot of these same emotions. I’m not one to usually post my link on other people’s blogs, but I felt like you might appreciate and have insight to some of my perspectives. I teach middle school and high school, but many of the questions and emotions are similar!
http://findingravity.com/2012/01/30/keep-reaching/
Keep writing, love your style,
Carley