Today we are officially closing the schools for the June winter holidays and I am ecstatic. It’s finally time to rest, detox and relief stress. After a hectic few weeks of examinations, my mind and body went through the most. I love what I do. It’s true when they say that teaching is a calling. Those who regard it simply as a job or profession never last long in it. But I do wish that we stick to what we get paid for and be compensated for the extra miles that we go to at the request of our employers.
Although I am over the moon thinking of how many days of rest are ahead, I am still a bit upset over the first week of my holidays. I will be spending most of next week, my first week of the holidays, stuck in a workshop held at a town over. The workshop starts at 8 am and ends at 4 pm. This means I’ll still be at work and for longer. What’s upsetting the most is that we are not being financially rewarded for this sacrifice of our personal time. I’ll be working the whole week for free.
Don’t get me wrong, workshops are an essential part of teacher development and betterment of the education system as a whole. I always gain valuable skills and information whenever I attend them. I rather do enjoy them. They are essential BUT they come at the sacrifice of the teachers’ personal time.
I am a newly wed. I’ve been with my wife for ten years now and I love spending every single waking moment with her. We are trying to make a baby and be a complete family. My parents are dying to see and hold their grand babies. This is the perfect time to practice but rather than doing that, I’ll be spending my personal free time attending a workshop that is two hours away in another town.
Here’s my grief, why aren’t workshops held during schooling time? The department makes special time for extracurricular activities to take place during school days. There are functions held during school days. The one important component that’s excluded is a workshop. Why is this? Isn’t it as important as functions and extracurricular activities? This makes absolutely no sense to me.
If teachers are to sacrifice their personal time, their rest time, time they should spend with their families, shouldn’t the department of education sacrifice something also to show appreciation for the sacrifice? Money isn’t everything but no one should work and sacrifice their families for free.
Continuous development is necessary for any profession, especially a young developing one such as teaching. We’re in a trial and error phase where the department is trying to figure how to properly run this profession. My only concern is that teachers are being taken advantage of without any reciprocation by the department. Such issues are amongst those to be reviewed and ironed out in the near future as continuous development takes place.
