Ben Jatos is a high school English teacher in a Portland, Oregon area high school. He has taught for 20 years. He just started his own blog, and he began by asking why he became a teacher and why he continues to teach.
He begins:
“As a new school year begins, I think it’s important for every teacher to answer the question: Why do I teach? This year, this is my answer.
“When I reflect on the circumstances that led me into teaching, there are three main things that happened to me prior to declaring as an education major in college.
“First, when I was 17, my father told me that when I went to college I should earn a degree that came with a title. For example, if I were to major in business I wouldn’t leave college as a businessman. But if I had a degree in education, I would exit as a teacher.
“Second, my senior year in high school I had an English teacher named Trece Greene who made her job seem important, fun, and honorable.
“And third, I took an intro to education class as a sophomore in college and I loved it immediately. Path set.
“The reasons I stay
“Now after 20 years in the classroom, I look at the reasons I stay.
“First, I want to provide for my family and after so many years, and an advanced degree, I can do so with the help of my wife’s fulltime office job. But I know that most people have it rougher than I do.
“Second, I love my job. I can sincerely say that I look forward to each and every day spent with students in the classroom.
“Third, it’s the light bulbs. When a person all of a sudden has an epiphany and figures something out, light bulbs appear over their head. I love seeing light bulbs in my class.
“Fourth, I teach because there is honor in my chosen profession. Serving 150 students in my classroom and the other 1,400 in my school is a task that I take seriously. When a parent releases their child – the most important thing in the world to them – to my school and also to me for guidance, instruction, mentoring, compassion, and a myriad of other roles which can pop up, I don’t want to let those parents or children down in any way. I still remember my sixth grade teacher who was mean to me in front of the class and would pick on most of the kids. She haunts me. I do not want to be that person and have no respect for any teacher that does the same. Conversely, I remember my fourth grade teacher who made me believe that I could accomplish anything. To this day, that man, Jon Snyder, is a huge inspiration.”
Read on to learn about the low points and also the incredible rewards of teaching.
Ben ends by saying:
“Twenty years down and twenty to go. Why do I teach? Because I woudln’t want to do anything else.”
As the saying on Twitter goes: #evaluatethat!
Diane Ravitch's blog 
When a person all of a sudden has an epiphany and figures something out, light bulbs appear over their head. I love seeing light bulbs in my class.
Lovely. And so true.
Nothing like this is honored in the current quest for perfected alignments, learning progressions fully worked out as if there are uniform increments in understanding this or that, or in trying to perfect a skill, or in acquiring an affinity for learning more about something and letting that grow into a long-running passion.
Too much of teaching and learning is construed in terms of grade-levels, stair-steps, ladders with equal interval rungs, tidy systems of prerequisites.
Most of us have been blessed with a mind that can hop. skip, and jump from here to there; find in one small comment the missing connector to other ideas; “get it” suddenly with images in mind.
All of that unseen activity–the great wonder of “invisible” learning–is largely unexplained. It cannot be measured. It refuses to be trapped by accountability schemes.
Seeing that spark is like a gift to every teacher. It is what gives every teacher a reason to love what they do.
Laura Chapman, I have been a fan for years. Truly well stated comment, thank you.
Teaching, don’t you agree, is generally a calling? Throwback to a simpler time when we’d ask kids, and were asked ourselves, “what do you want to be when you grow up?”
My daughter has wanted to be a teacher since the age of 2. That, she learned to emulate going to daycare/preschool. I’m happy she has fulfilled her dream, and actually got a teaching job (finally) and is in her 2nd year; however, its a horrible time for teachers. I fear for her future. Life used to be much easier, simpler, and cheaper.
Isn’t it amazing when Michelle Rhee, as an advocate for destroying public education, can pay herself a $200,000 annual salary from a non-profit, plus monies for giving speeches, yet she and her ilk and the men behind the curtains believe teachers don’t even deserve $50,000 per year? Or benefits? Or pensions? Or health care? Or the right to due process? The money they spend trying to screw the middle class is criminal.
It’s a wonderful thing to love one’s job. And very, very rare.
I often wonder the same thing. Why did I get into teaching. I think I always loved learning new things and I liked sharing what I learned with others. Sometimes people become teachers because they were inspired by their teachers. I can’t say that any one of my teachers inspired me to join the profession but rather it was many of them. My father also would tell me to work hard in school so I could have a job that I enjoyed; he did not enjoy his job. There is much to be said about fulfillment in your job. Sure we don’t have the same salaries as other professionals, but we are paid in so many other ways besides money. I think most teachers were born to teach. I certainly have learned a lot in my 13 years of teaching. I remember my first teaching experience and feeling like I belonged in the classroom. It felt natural. I don’t think I chose the teaching profession, the teaching profession chose me.
I am proud to say that I teach along side of Ben. Not only does he inspire his students, but he also inspires me! Thanks Ben!