"I came to teaching on a mission. I was spit in the face": Teachers are leaving the education system

Livnat left because of the money and after earning eight times as much, Eleanor got tired of kidnapping parents and principals and July decided to run away from the "slavery system" even before she finished her internship.

3 past and present teachers explain in a conversation with Walla!

Why they gave up the profession.

"Everyone left swallowing saliva to keep going"

Uri Sela

19/03/2022

Saturday, 19 March 2022, 08:00 Updated: 08:29

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"I started an internship last September, I'm in my final year of teaching studies. I work almost full time and earn 5,000 shekels. I can not afford to leave my parents' house, rent an apartment and start a life. A person studies four years in teaching, not a simple degree, and after "All the investment in the end is for a friend of mine who works at AM: PM to earn more than me. It's delusional" - this is how 27-year-old Yuli (pseudonym) described her experience of entering the education system.

She already knows she will not continue next year.

Money is a central motif in teachers' desire to throw away the erasable marker and leave teaching, but do not hang all the blame on it.

Student violence that is backed by protective parents, principals' fear of standing by the teacher's side, lack of appreciation, undefined hours and a narrow horizon of progress are just some of the reasons we have taught past and present teachers to abandon the profession in a conversation with Walla !.

More on Walla!

Running away from classrooms: The number of teachers leaving the profession has increased by 23%

To the full article

"I came to this job from a place of values. It feels like a spit in the face."

Teacher and students in class (Photo: Reuven Castro)

July began this year the internship period in teaching at a school in Bat Yam.

In the few months that have passed, she says, she has understood the source of the contempt for teachers.

"It's a system of slavery, not of education," she argued.

The main problem, she says, is the differences in the conditions offered by the private market - and the lack of experience to compete with it.

"The Ministry of Education has a lot of mistakes in terms of payroll accountants. I found myself submitting travel forms, 101, several times in private companies. I have never encountered such organizational problems."

"It is also a feeling of contempt, both within the walls of the system, both from the parents and from the students," she added.

"Parents are aware of the status of the teacher in Israel and allow themselves to be underestimated. How can one evaluate someone who studies for free? And I understand why there is no appreciation for teachers, because I also now do not appreciate teachers - they do not know how to evaluate themselves. "Gives you a few hundred shekels more. Every remaining teacher swallows the saliva to continue."

"I came to this job from a place of values, out of a great mission. It feels like spitting in the face," she accused.

"It is enough for quality people to take a step in the education system so that they understand that they have to flee to the private market. I know I will leave at the end of the year, maybe I will move to high-tech. With a mission you do not go to the writer."

23% increase in the number of teaching staff leaving the education system (Photo: ShutterStock)

July is not alone.

In recent years, more and more teachers are giving up and leaving: a report published this week by the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) identified a 23% increase in the number of teaching staff leaving the education system. 6,984 in the previous year. In Hebrew education, the situation is worse than in Arab education, with a dropout rate of 4.5% compared to 3% in the last two decades.

"I left a year and a half ago. It's first of all the very low salary, I reached about seven thousand and a half after ten years and a master's degree. In between I did private lessons to scratch a few more shekels but felt exhausted," described the situation to Livnat Hadad, 35, who lives in Moshav A singer in the Gaza Strip.

"We had a load - from the supervision, from the management - and at the end of the month you feel like you work non-stop and without pay. I started working from the mobile as a franchisee for a healthy lifestyle. After a year I earned eight times what I earned from teaching."

Livnat also says that she loved the students and the teaching very much, but could not cope with the difficult conditions.

"Ultimately you have to feed your kids at home. I was told I was crazy to leave a safe place and permanently, my dreams were more important. And I'm the happiest person in the world to have made that move. A week ago I returned from a month-long family trip to Thailand, something I could never think of Even when I was a teacher. "

"I see the teachers' protest and say 'come on, make noise, do not be submissive'. They are afraid to rebel but we are a crazy force. Full of teachers retiring and I understand that so much. "It is only in Israel. In every reformed country, teachers earn much more and are valued. In Israel, you are looked at with a crooked look when you say you are a teacher."

"As time goes on it becomes more challenging."

Livnat Hadad (Photo: courtesy of those photographed)

Eleanor Ben Moshe, 28, left in the middle of the current school year after three years at the Ministry of Education.

She taught in special education classes in two schools, now she is a prison teacher as part of the HILA program. The chain of events that led to this is a painful example of teachers' claims of lack of backing.

"One of the reasons for my departure is the power given to school principals. Not everyone sits there by right. On me, for example, the principal threatened," she said.

"We were for a long time in the Corona period with isolations and shortcomings and everyone fills all the roles. The rights of those who teach integration are violated and even then the gaps are big. The principal called for them to come and pick her up. The grandmother came, entered the classroom shouting, 'I'm standing for half an hour looking at you, how are you behaving.' She even lied because the girl was at the principal's. "She knows the principal well, and went on to tell her that I said the girl was not suitable for the system."

Eleanor Ben Moshe (Photo: Courtesy of the photographers)

"The principal, who is supposed to protect me, called me and did a show trial in front of the mother of the girl who attacked me. We are under daily threat from parents and do not experience appreciation from them. They sent various letters to denounce me from the Ministry of Education and shame that there are teachers like me. When she said that no one heard my side and that I would send a letter, she said that she was not looking for teachers who would express their opinions and strong women who would make their voices heard - and that if I sent a letter it would have consequences. "She wrote to me that she said that if I sent it would have consequences and asked me to report to her office, and said that we were parting now and asked me to write a letter that I was leaving. That was the end."

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