Good article on the forces that are driving the school bus driver shortage in America. Schools are hurting in a many different ways - there is also a school teacher shortage driven by some of the same forces.
According to a June survey of 2,690 members of the National Education Association, 32% said the pandemic drove them to plan to leave the profession earlier than expected. Another survey by the RAND Corp. said the pandemic exacerbated attrition, burnout and stress on teachers, who were almost twice as likely as other employed adults to feel frequent job-related stress and almost three times more likely to experience depression.
The life of a school bus driver is no fun and the wages certainly don't make up for it. A teacher may get more satisfaction from their job in some circumstances but it may not be enough to compensate for all that is broken and dysfunctional. Things only got worse with the pandemic. My friends with school-age children tell me the classes are over-crowded because many teachers have quit and school is fully in-person. The kids are not adjusting well to returning to class full-time after remote learning for over a year - the older ones don't see why their physical presence is required and acting out their disengagement. None of this in addition to stress of the virus spreading around among unvaccinated kids is helping the worn-out teachers.
In a child's mind, their home-room teacher is there forever - whatever their definition of that forever is. It provides and anchor and source of comfort. They grow attached to this person. In times of turbulence in their personal life, this teacher could be the one they go to for support. When these teachers come and go from their lives, the disruption goes well beyond education. The child begins to see that everything in the world as fickle and unreliable, diminishing their desire to persevere - who will be there to cheer them for trying and succeeding in the end.
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