Mourning the broken promises of "next year"

Note: while this post centers around devastation and grief, it is grounded in the gratitude I have for my school community, including my principal and students' families, who have supported and encouraged me from day one. 

---

When my principal asked me into his office after school on a Thursday, I thought I was in deep trouble. Questions spiraled through my mind in their usual destabilizing pattern when I’m anxious. Did I use the wrong tone in that parent email I sent this afternoon? Did I miscommunicate something to a colleague? This protective mechanism, despite its reliable record, did not prepare me for the heartbreaking conversation we were about to have.

​After exchanging pleasantries, he paused and then bit the bullet. My position was cut for next year. I was laid off.
​

Sitting across from his cozy desk surrounded in college regalia, teaching textbooks, and the tempting bowl of wrapped chocolates, I nodded in disbelief. Two minutes passed until my shock response unleashed the tears I did not know were waiting to fall. As I tried to pull myself together (unsuccessfully), I forced my attention on his calm and steady voice. He explained that there was a second round of district budget cuts due to reductions in enrollment, despite his advocacy for me to stay on staff. “Unfortunately,” he sighed hesitantly, “one of those cuts affected your position.”
I could not focus after that. I heard certain reassuring phrases orbit the room before the shock took over me. The grief over suddenly losing my dream job was devastating. What had I done to deserve this news? 

​Before that meeting, I was almost certain I was renewed for the following school year. Near the beginning of April, my school hosted its annual budgetary meeting where class size projections are presented to all staff. All non-renewed staff were consulted and informed of the news and their status beforehand. My name, however, was on the list of renewed staff. All other communication indicated I was renewed, including my summative report. 

So, when I was laid off three weeks after the budgets were reportedly set, I was blindsided. I dragged myself back to my classroom in a daze. On my way, a few loving coworkers intercepted me, seeing the tears down my face, and pulled me into their arms. “I’m so sorry,” they whispered in my ear, “I can’t believe it.” Together, four of us sat in my cheerfully colorful classroom – my first classroom that took me and my mom a week to put together, delicately trimming bulletin board paper and meticulously arranging furniture bought from Lakeshore and Facebook Marketplace. My coworkers, who I now consider family, sat around me in a circle as I mourned all of the broken promises of “next year.”
With my head in my hands, I told them how I felt unjustly punished for an act I did not commit. I felt robbed of the opportunities that next year presented. I felt stripped of the community I belonged to and deeply cherished. Finally, I felt inundated by all of the novelty I now have to overcome once more. 

In the past three years, I have repeatedly picked up my life and moved it somewhere new. I moved from Duluth, to my parents’ home, to Montevideo, to Maldonado, and back to Minnesota. I bounced from job to job, moved between two teaching jobs in under a year, and processed the fatiguing reverse culture shock while balancing the unlimited responsibilities of a teacher in the U.S.. While constant change offered undeniable and irreplaceable benefits in everlasting cross-cultural friendships, diversity in experiences, and profound professional connections, I could not keep up with the hustle of job hunting forever.

Across cities and countries, I have started over countless times. I learned new systems and structures and found my community in each one, just to leave due to the temporary status of the position. Going into this school year, I was ready for my feet to grow their own roots in soil. Instead, they settled deeper into sand before being yanked out just before the tide rolled in.

In spite of this devastating news, I know that in the end, everything will work as it was meant to. Through my experience with constant change, some willing and some not, I have made it to the other side and beyond stronger, more resilient, and more prepared than before. Although I will still mourn the broken promises of next year (see below), next year will still be there with different opportunities I have yet to uncover. 
​

The broken promises of "next year"

Next year, I won’t be able to watch my students grow up and into themselves. I can’t greet them each day as they pass me on their way to fourth grade or give them hugs of encouragement on the first day of school. I won’t see who will grow taller than me, watch their friendships evolve, or hear them play the instruments they chose at the end of this year. There will be other students, but there won’t be the opportunity to watch these students grow.

Next year, I won’t hear my teammate’s bellowing laugh down the hallway; watch Queer Eye on her couch during flexible learning days; pick up bulk orders of take-out banh mi sandwiches we ordered from our district’s go-to Vietnamese French restaurant; or ask her the countless questions I know she will have a silly or sensible answer to. I can’t eat lunch with my other teammate in her room, trading chocolates, celebrations, and rants; plan and collaborate on lesson plans; hear about her salsa lessons and weekends spent running around with her daughters; or sit with her on the playground bench at extra recess. There will be other teammates, but there won’t be another Karen or Melissa.

Next year, I can’t see my mentor each day or feel her contagious Argentinian spirit; she can’t pop by my room for a quick chat, planning session, or check-in. I will miss how she let me lead and encouraged me to find my way and feel confidence in myself and in my teaching. She can’t sit inches away from my face, grip my hands, and share affirmations when I am at my lowest. I will miss our special bond of shared cultural experience, calling each other “boluda” in the hallways because we are kindred spirits, and laughing deeply while also getting down to business. There will be other mentors, but there won’t be another Agu.

Next year, I won’t be able to dive deeper into the curriculum. After having this year under my belt, there is so much more I can do with the curriculum, other lessons I did not have time to teach or could teach better, and new projects I wanted to explore. I can’t play my cello at the staff concert in January. I can’t wait backstage holding back giggles as one of the 5th grade teachers and music teacher apply each other’s makeup for their themed performance. I can’t greet this year’s families in the hallway during conference nights; or have their younger children in my class. I worked tirelessly to build strong relationships with students’ families, meet students’ siblings and say “hola” when I saw their class in the hallway, and adapt materials to meet my students’ diverse needs and areas of growth. Everything will be new next year.

I won’t have the same classroom next year: a room with plants covering the walls and shelves; a room where propagations line the windowsill, waiting to root in donated pots and coffee mugs; walls covered in students’ photos, gifted drawings, writing samples, and messages displaying our classroom rules as reminders for each other; a room that we built together, cleaned together, loved together, and learned in together.

And next year, I can’t as easily connect with any of the dedicated, kind, hilarious, patient, and giving staff at my school. I won’t see one of the second teachers escort her class to specialists draped in a tortilla blanket.

I can’t sit on the floor of one fifth-grade teacher’s floor after school to grade papers with Spanish pop serenading us in the background.

I can’t laugh with the fourth-grade teacher over the new Snoopy jazz mix I found on YouTube to play for my students during snack time.

I won’t wear my floral Duluth Trading overalls to match the gym and SEL teachers on overalls Friday. I can’t have daily check-ins with the considerate art teacher down the hall or ask her where her colorful earrings are from.

I can’t stop by the other two new teachers at my school to give them hugs or hang out during their prep periods.

I won’t ask the sixty-year-old sixth-grade teacher who runs ultra marathons how his most recent race went.

I can’t eat lunch in the lounge to hear about the lives of the teacher who leads aerial sling classes on the weekends; works at concert venues and meets musical artists on the side; takes care of her newborn baby and is on maternity leave; attends race car tournaments with her family; rock climbs; indulges in weekly sauna trips and daily jazzercise classes; rides a motorcycle in summer and gives the warmest hugs; and attends Friday yoga classes with me at our gym. There will be another school community to know and love, but there won’t be another Caitlin, Alison, Doug, Miriam, Laura, Jaime, Dan, Millie, Daysy, Kari, Emily, Mary, Flor, Jose, and the many more irreplaceable educators and leaders at my school.

---

Did you enjoy this post?

Consider sending a Venmo payment to the Journal of an Evolving Teacher business page!

I spend at least 3 hours on every blog post, from writing the first draft to creating accompanying graphics for social media. Your small contribution will compensate for all the work that makes this blog possible. Thank you!

Venmo

---

Thanks for joining in the chaos!