Bend when you can, snap when you have to: I guess it is time to leave the classroom!

I’ve been sitting on leaving the classroom since the beginning of the school year. There is so much going on in the world of education that I feel like it is time. The demands teachers have to put up with, the struggle with receiving no support from parents or administrators, the amount of paperwork, the amount of unappreciativeness is extremely exhausting and tiring. The upside of taking the time to rethink what to do outside of the classroom, I found a new passion–instructional design. 

When I was in my last masters program, it was mandatory to take the Instructional Design in Educational Technology (IDET). In IDET, we had to design a course in Blackboard. The goal was to create and design a lesson plan, as well as the online activities that go with the lesson plan and course. I don’t remember what else was involved in designing the course, like Fink’s 3-Column table method or the Understanding by Design in backwards design method, but I did enjoy playing around in Blackboard creating my own design. I didn’t know or realize then that COVA was an integral part of this process.

Fast forward to March 2020, online classroom design came in handy. I remember saying to my friends in the IDET class, “When will we ever use this?”. I think the “tech gods” were laughing at us big time in 2017 and 2020…they knew what was going to happen. If I’m correct, myself and another colleague were the only two teachers on our campus using Google Classroom prior to COVID. I know I had all my students in all three sections of my Google Classroom, they knew how to use it, they knew how to access the work, and they knew how to log on. The other grade levels and students were struggling. 

Now, we are in 2025, and I’ve changed since then. I am becoming bored with being in the classroom. While I love teaching, it is all the extra jobs that come with it…if you know, you know. Entering this program was a big leap of faith and deep reflection. My husband helped me in making this decision. His answer was “Just as long as you can make more money!” We both laughed from this because he also said “I want to retire early!” I just rolled my eyes at him. 

I am glad I made the right choice for myself. The beginning was rough, only due to the adjustment from one university to another, and changes in a program and different professors, but it is a good change where I am building myself to be stronger, courageous, a leader, and creative in my work. While the last program I was in was only a masters and certification program, I feel like I can provide more authenticity of myself in my work and use my creativity in the process–which is what the ADL program is all about.