Pushout in a Privileged Independent School

• In Event: Teachers in Crisis, Teaching in Crisis: Unpacking Individual and Systemic Teacher Deprofessionalization and Dehumanization

Abstract

Objectives or purposes
Another way that teacher attrition can be invisibilized is by the relative lack of research focused on teacher experiences and working conditions in independent school settings. The objectives of this paper are to highlight the experiences of a teacher in a privileged independent school, to examine if/how systemic factors pushing out public school teachers also are present in independent school settings and provide a counter-narrative to the belief that teacher crises only exist in urban public schools serving diverse communities.

Perspectives
Independent (i.e. non-public, non-parochial) schools are often conceptualized through a stereotypical lens of a New England Dead Poets Society elite lens (Kane, 1991; Whitted, 2001). While Balossi and Hernandez (2016) note independent schools’ criteria for quality to move beyond standardized measures to include strong student relationships, growth mindset, and alignment with school culture alongside strong pedagogical knowledge and content expertise, there remains little research that centers the voices of independent school teachers who have left or are considering leaving their K-12 classrooms.

Methods & Data
This case study is based on auto-ethnographic reflective data (Chang, 2016) from a former middle school French-immigrant language teacher in an elite California independent school. The study challenges the idea that teacher crises are isolated only in one type of setting.

Key Incidents
My first year was very challenging. I wanted to quit within three months because I felt stressed and overworked. The high pressure was constant, communication was unclear, and administration did not support me. I was assigned a teacher to support me during my first year, but the school did not give her extra time and she did not have time. I would get emails saying that I had missed meetings and announcing events at the last minute without explanation. I constantly felt that I was failing at my job for not knowing what was going on and what I was expected to do.
Administration was never available for meetings or to answer questions. Taking sick days was difficult because I constantly received phone calls and emails during my sick days. One of my colleagues had to give medical proof and explain why she was absent when she took sick days. When I brought up the stress I was facing on a weekly basis to my chair department, she encouraged me to “toughen up” and to choose my battles.
I was constantly working. Not only was I teaching my subject, but I had to teach other courses (advisory, flex etc.) and had additional duties such as carpool, lunch duties, break duties, attending games and afterschool and weekend events, committee service, event preparation, helping with an exchange program, attending a 5-day outdoor trip with students, meeting with parents and/or students after school, online and in-person.
Finally, when racist incidents occurred on campus with students, teachers had to address them right away in class, but the administration did not support us. Moreover, parents were very powerful and too often the students did not face any consequences for their actions.

Author

• Gaelle Mounioloux, University of Washington