Resilience

How do we prevent teachers from quitting their profession three years down the road. I think the answer to this lies in experience. An individual can want to be a teacher very strongly, but until they actually experience it, they will never know if it is right for them or not. I think teachers are a key component to helping students on whether or not they should become teachers or not. Often times, but not always, other teachers can recognize good teachers from potentially harmful ones and I believe that it's education professors' responsibilities to let students know if education isn't the major for them. If the student doesn't take it seriously, they may end up as one of those teachers who quits three years down the road.

I think the most important way to prevent teachers who become ex-teachers from occurring is to provide as much experience as possible. Students need to know what it feels like to be in charge of a group of kids. They need to know what it feels like to be the only one responsible for what those students will learn that year. Although this seems like it can only be accomplished through teaching, there are other ways of gaining experience. For example, getting involved in community outreach groups that deal with kids. Any exposure to being a leader of a group of kids can have a huge affect on if you are to be a teacher or not. If a future teacher avoids these situations which give them experience, they will never know if teaching is right for them or not.

As future teachers, it's our duty to see if this is the major we really want to be involved in. If we don't take the initiative to gain experience, we'll never know until it's too late. So my advice would be to get involved with the school systems around you. Volunteer to help out at schools, tutor, find any chance you can get to deal with the kids that you intend to have a job working with. Unless students are pushed to explore these experiences, teachers will continue to go into their profession and quit. I think colleges can affect this as well. By requiring more classroom experience of students, the students will be forced to find out if that's what they really want to do or not. I think Ed. 185/115 is a great example of this. But this cannot be the only experience we settle for. We must look further and deeper.