Mental health in school is usually focused on students with teachers often left out of the discussion. Teachers are just as susceptible to mental health issues as students are and many schools and even districts do not seem to acknowledge that vulnerability. Numerous teachers have to juggle their work and home life, and sometimes it is not as seamless as it may seem.
“When you do a job like teaching or nursing there’s a lot of emotional labor you have to navigate,” Lauren Larson, AP Language and Composition and speech teacher, said. “When you’re teaching kids, sometimes things can be emotional, or kids get really stressed out … because there is a lot of work that goes on [outside of class] … a lot of people enter into teaching, and because of the stress, or the emotional labor or unrealistic expectations, [they] leave.”
Teaching comes with many responsibilities like any other job, such as grading papers, creating assignments and teaching concepts to inexperienced students. These responsibilities can all be hard when they pile onto each other, building a harsh environment for anyone. However, many people overlook the mental aspect of teaching. Teachers need to keep the class positive while presenting, socializing and motivating students, and this positivity can be taxing work, making it harder to teach.
“I think it is hard to deal with your mental health when you sort of have to perform, because I think teaching is a lot about performance,” Larson said. “Not that you’re being insincere but that you’re kind of managing the tempo and the pace and the atmosphere of the classroom. If you are struggling with mental health, it is harder to carry out that performance.”
A teacher’s mental health can reflect on their students, not just on the responsibilities of their job. When one cannot perform, students can see this problem as something being wrong with them, or that they are a problem. In actuality, the teacher is just not at their one hundred percent, and it is not the student’s fault.
“[When you are having a bad day] you don’t want students to misinterpret something that you are dealing with personally as a reflection on them,” Larson said. “Sometimes it is harder to control your emotions or have patience when you’re struggling.”
Like many people, teachers have ways of getting through the day if they are not feeling good, or ways to stay sane while they get through the school year. Many teachers are reenergized by their students and are passionate about what they do. It is when they start to feel alone or stressed that their mental health starts to hurt.
“I’ll find the classes picking me up, giving me energy and the students, and the job [kind] of [invigorates] me,” Kyle Tingley, Humanities and Social Studies teacher, said. “Just being in that space and the passion for the job can help. Knowing the weekend is coming helps too. The teachers next door to me are a big help [if] I need to touch base and check-in. That’s a powerful part of the support, the biggest part, the most immediate … if you’re not socializing, you can start to feel isolated in your room, but it’s important to check in and get out.”
Teachers are not always given much respect for the job that they do. They are an important influence on the ideas, education and future of the youth and should be treated with respect.
“When I was living overseas … [there was] definitely a noticeable sense of respect and status for teachers; not that they get paid more necessarily, it’s more about the standing [as a teacher],” Tingley said. “You’re referred to as ‘teacher’, [and] you kinda have this title. There is a belief, [or] sense of respect that you’re contributing to the community. I don’t get that same sense [in America]. Often a lot of people say ‘thank you for what you do’, or ‘I couldn’t do what you do’, [but] it just doesn’t have the same tone.”L
With teaching being treated as lesser than many professions, a question that arises is why that discrepancy appears. One reason could be that earning a lot of money is not prevalent in teaching, which is something not so ideal for living in a capitalist country. It could also be that some people do not look at teaching as a complicated job or that teaching has always been a female-dominated profession.
“I think historically teaching has been looked down upon because it’s a position that largely women do, which is one of the ways they could pay teachers less because ladies mostly did the job,” Larson said. “And, I think some people think that it doesn’t take a very high standard to be a teacher, which I think also makes people look down upon it.”
Along with students, teachers get many breaks too. Currently, teachers receive mental health days from the district, where they can take a day off while still getting paid. This allows teachers to take a day to refresh, and get their passion flowing. Overall, a break is a needed thing for most people, teachers and students alike.
“We get a lot of time off, which I also appreciate because I think that also allows a lot of space for creativity, which … is important to me,” Larson said. “To just be able to be creative in whatever form that takes.”
The district, or rather the state, is not always accepting of radical ideas like mental health days. Some restrictions and laws get in the way of many student-teacher relationships, such as some topics being illegal to be taught in schools. For example, a bill was recently signed that would mandate that teachers notify parents about the pronouns that a student may use if they do not match the gender given on school documents. It creates a new level of distrust for students toward teachers, because of the fear of being outed.
“I think what can be stressful sometimes are laws that are imposed in the classroom or like restrictions on what we can say or teach,” Larson said. “Of course, in any interaction, you don’t want to be offensive to people, but you also don’t wanna be afraid of ideas … it’s pretty antithetical to education … there was that law that was passed [where] we couldn’t acknowledge someone’s gender identity, [which] I think is very bad for teacher [and] student mental health … it feels like our relationships are being policed.”
Mental health has always been a hot topic in the twenty-first century. It has been debated, it has been defined and it has been studied, but there is still a stigma surrounding it. Arguably, this stigma can be attributed to decades of framing mental health as a thing that “crazy” people worry about, and as something that not everyone grapples with. The truth is mental health is a major part of life, and as a community, many people should be open about addressing and handling mental health problems like any other illness.
“I don’t think there should be any stigma if somebody needs to stay at home and rest and reset if they’re stressed out,” Larson said. “Stress or feeling bad is physical as well as mental, and it needs to be treated like any other sickness.”
