- Holly Acker worked as an elementary school teacher for six years before retiring in 2020.
- Now he sells machinery, where he earns an extra $20,000, works from home and has more flexibility in his work.
- "There was always something added to our plate, but nothing was taken away," he said.
This article is based on a conversation with Holly Acker, former technology sales teacher. Edited for length and clarity.
I started teaching because I enjoy sharing what I know and I love helping people by nature. All professional examinations in the university are related to learning. My mother was also a teacher and I think I wanted to be like her.
I used to teach at a school called a school for the poor. You teach students in poverty differently because you have to make sure their basic needs are met before they can learn. I had to rethink what I thought about learning.
Some have had difficult family lives or come from single-parent families, so the highly structured school environment can be challenging. Many of the behaviors we saw in our school left me feeling tired from time to time. The students were never to blame; They do not know how to express their feelings, so adults, as they know, may behave inappropriately, but not always.
After all, they need more support than I can provide. I had about 23 students when I was in third grade and 20 when I taught kindergarten. Sometimes I felt a little tight and thin. There was always something on our plate, but nothing was taken away. We feel we have a lot of work to do.
Before I started teaching, I was a carefree person, but over time I realized that teaching was taking away from me.
My day was not healthy. I was tired and stressed and my body was telling me in no uncertain terms, "You can't keep doing this." I was in fight or flight mode.
During the pandemic, our students had the option of studying online or in person, so we were actually doing two jobs. When my full-time students attend extra classes or physical education classes, I return to my classroom to teach online.
You can imagine how difficult it is to teach kindergarten children online. Much of what you learn is tactile, like holding a pencil. How to teach through computers? How do you sit in front of the computer and listen to the speech?
During the day we had a little rest. Lunch took 30 minutes, but it ended up being 20 minutes because it took five minutes for the kids to eat and five minutes to bring them back. And my preparation time was spent in online classes.
You're not going to learn and think you're going to leave. It took me a year or two to decide that I was going to quit and learn how to get a corporate job.
Every year I start working for Account Executive in 2020. It was different, but not that different from education. In my interviews, I say that teachers are constantly selling knowledge to students. We always monitor the progress of our students to see if what we are doing is making a difference. You have to buy them and that can be difficult because by law they have to be there.
So I looked at my new job the same way: I have a goal to achieve, I have tasks that bring me closer to that goal, and I track my progress along the way.
The difference in my daily life is night and day. When you've been surrounded by students for years, it can wear you down. I was inspired by the fact that 20 little personalities were sitting in a room all day with only 20 to 40 minute breaks. Now I can work alone and in a peaceful environment.
I used to drive 40 minutes one way. Now I work from home. Unlike teaching, which has a fairly tight schedule, I can make my own schedule. I have since been promoted to sales consultant and now make about $20,000 more than what I learned.
Many teachers, myself included, feel that teaching is not sustainable. I won't be back. I made that dream come true, but I'm glad I didn't do it again. All I did was teach, but I had no idea how many other ways there were to teach in the world. I teach at my current job, but not at school.
I learned a lot on my own. I have matured a lot and it has made me more empathetic.
I don't have all the answers on how to improve teaching, but ideally teachers should have smaller classes and more support for mental health teachers.
I know it can be hard for aspiring teachers to stop thinking, "I'm not happy with what I've been doing all my life." But if you leave this work, you are not harmed.
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