In the past two years, life has changed immensely. When thinking of COVID-19 there are many ways that one may have seen their life change, but one aspect that has not been talked about enough is how teacher life has altered. 

Teachers throughout the pandemic have had to adjust to the new changes and procedures that are constantly changing while also adapting to the exponential amount of absences all while keeping on a brave face for their students. With the crazy amount of teacher shortages and teachers quitting mid-year, it is now more clear than ever how mentally and physically tolling it is to be a teacher. 

When discussing how teaching was impacted by COVID-19, English teacher Xavier Pastrono had no hesitancy in admitting that it is hard to teach during such an influential time. Pastrano has been teaching at LHS for five years and in addition to that is also a father and a band member. Juggling all these engagements creates a very demanding lifestyle. He experiences long days at work, and after, he still had to go home and be a father and make time for himself as well. 

“The mental toll and the burnout not so much from the work in school but from depression, anxiety and COVID in general, there are days I get home and I’m tapped out,” said Pastrano. 

Pastrano also believes that one of the hardest changes he has experienced during the pandemic was the quick switch from in-person learning to online. Almost every teacher and student can relate to this dramatic shift in learning because no one was expecting it. There was no training for teachers who were only used to teaching in a classroom. However, Pastrano experienced teaching online classes, so he did have a little help before that helped him prepare for this.  

“Initially [the biggest change was] teaching face-to-face and then shifting to online; prior to that I had taught online classes at the college level where I take content and adjust it for an online platform, so that part wasn’t super difficult,” said Pastrano. 

Although Pastrano may have found adjusting his content to online somewhat easy, LHS geography teacher Regan Meyer contrasted that opinion by expressing how that was the hardest part of the transition. Without having past knowledge on teaching online, it was hard to have an entertaining lesson when she had such little time to prepare for it. With no prior knowledge or experience of teaching online, many teachers struggled immensely with this specific change. 

“Going online for the spring semester was a hard adjustment. No one was used to online coursework. It was hard to take these lessons that we’ve worked on for in-person and make them enjoyable online,” said Meyer. 

In the past year and a half, transitioning again back to in-person school, a lot had to be changed in order to meet COVID-19 safety guidelines. Last year some students even who wore masks had to quarantine for 10 days if they were close contacted, but now students are not even notified if they have been in close contact with someone who has recently caught the virus. Change is constantly happening with new variants and mask policies it is hard to keep up. Teachers noticed students falling behind or just their general well-being decline. Pastrano and Meyer agreed that it was hard to see their students go through so much and there is not much teachers can do to help them. 

“A lot of kids struggled returning to in-person school… the number of absences was out of control,” said Meyer.

Pastrano points out that this is not a situational experience; everyone is facing this.

“It’s been a challenging few years, everyone has been through a lot and I need to keep that in mind,” said Pastrano. 

With all of these factors considered, there is no doubt why teacher shortages are such a major issue right now. However, Pastrano and Meyer both pointed out how they love teaching and would not rather do anything else. Although this may be a hard time to be teaching, the pros still overwhelm the cons at most points. Because of the crazy amount of pressure and stress teachers are under, this is why teachers need to be appreciated now more than ever. They do so much for all of their students which rarely goes appreciated. They put in long hours to ensure that we get the feedback we need to thrive, and most have been very understanding during this time. 

“All of us love to teach. Sometimes it’s really hard to be a teacher, but I would never trade what I do for anything,” said Meyer.