Thomas Rhett wrote the lyrics. The song is “Be A Light,” with Keith Urban, Chris Tomlin, Hillary Scott & Reba McEntire. I’ll pick a few favorite lines:

“In a world full of hate, be a light
In a time full of doubt, just believe
In a place that needs change, make a difference.”

Hi teacher reader, and anyone else reading this today! Teaching is all about being the light and the change in kids’ lives. Even when we are sending a student to the Dean’s office with a referral form in hand, those referrals tend to be attempts to help a kid back on track while offering others the uninterrupted instruction they deserve.

Are you hurting today, reader? Did you give virtual teaching your absolute all, only to end the year on a down note?  Maybe you were riffed or even nonrenewed.  Maybe you were forced to pass a passel of kids who did nothing for months. Many schools did not let anyone fail.  Maybe you gave a “C” to one of those kids who did no work only to have angry parents attack you for their child’s non-effort.  How dare you lower his or her GPA!? If you had been a better teacher, maybe you would have received some work!!

I remain mystified by those administrators who made no allowances for the challenges of teachers trying to manage the remote learning needs of their own families while also helping all those middle or high school students who may or may not have entered their Google classrooms.  For many teachers, the last few months have been crazy busy and an abysmal downer. Whether by Zoom, Facebook or Google, so many teachers tried to make virtual learning work, with varying degrees of success.  

If you are hurting, maybe it will help to understand the whole game was loaded. For people in some places, no win was possible. I won’t dwell right now on the many reasons why that’s true. I’d like to provide support instead. Thomas Rhett wrote this song and made me think of my fellow educators: “Be a Light” – because that’s what teachers are. Teachers are lights in the darkness. In some times or neighborhoods, they may only be faint candles in fierce winds, trying their hardest to get that angry child to eat a little breakfast and calm down before the start of the day.  But day after day, they walk back in to help the adolescent girl who still cannot read, the frightened child who hopes dad will NOT be paroled, the lost boy who is hiding his confusion by cursing to get thrown out of class, and so many, many other children… all with their own stories and hopes, all carrying their own invisible baggage

Eduhonesty: You made it through the year. Be proud of yourself. Focus on what you accomplished and if you did not get the support you deserved, remember the faces that matter, the faces of the kids in your classroom. Despite all those mugs with apples on them, teachers remain one of the most underappreciated resources of our time.

In a time full of war, teachers fight for peace.

In a time full of doubt, teachers believe in students — and not just the advantaged ones. We believe in that girl who arrived at the age of fourteen with about twenty words of English. We believe in the boy with ADHD, as we try to teach him coping strategies to help stay focused. We believe in the girl who is juggling high school and a full time job at the supermarket, helping her at odd moments and during lunch with her homework. We believe in the OCD girl who is sometimes paralyzed because her rainbow has become too uneven, or the blue came out too dark, and we help guide her to a gentler place where a rainbow does not have to be abandoned because of one flaw. We quietly buy supplies for the homeless boy, and books for the girl whose single mother just lost her job.

In a world full of hate, teachers try to bring light.

In a time full of noise, sometimes teachers are the only ones listening to children crying out to be heard.

In a place that needs change — as so many do today — teachers provide safe havens for the sad, the struggling, the lonely and the hungry, along with books, Jolly Ranchers, healthier snacks, sparkly bookmarks, learning games and, most importantly, a sense of belonging.

Are you hurting today? “In a race you can’t win, slow it down. Yeah, you only get one go around… In a race you can’t win, just slow it down.” You worked and worked and worked and somehow it didn’t all get done? Forgive yourself. Some of the expectations in April and May were simply nuts. You can create the lesson. You can’t make Johnny log in.

We have been locked in the virtual fight, and I am beyond impressed with how valiantly the teachers I know have fought. But a number of you are feeling hammered in the endgame. Don’t. Just don’t. Take a deep breath, maybe find a guided meditation or bake some gingerbread cookies. Put the pain down. Teachers have been holding torches aloft through the spring of 2020, making a difference in America and all across the world. Many have been marching in streets across the country for weeks now, seeing the faces on their rosters in the face of George Floyd. Others have simply been filling out days and days of “paperwork,” trying to hold on to jobs that help feed their families, while also reading virtual bedtime stories to students scattered by quarantine.

Embrace that effort. Embrace yourself. In a time full of doubt, just believe in yourself.

The last verse of this song resonates with me:

“Yeah, it’s hard to live in color
When you just see black and white
In a world full of hate, be a light.”

And don’t let anybody dim your light because this year went sideways on us all. To all the teachers who tried to slay the dragon, while managing your own families, new technology, new software, children without access to technology or software, children missing their graduations and dances, children who were sad, afraid, or bored, holidays without celebrations, and day after day of new educational experiments, I’d like to say

P.S. And to any administrators or other decision makers who did not say thank-you — or who made it a practice to say some version of “thank-you but why did you do this when you should have done that instead?” — Shame on you!

Your search for the ideal mask may be well launched by now. In northern Illinois, most stores will not allow you to enter unless you cover your face. Many cities and suburbs require masks. Whether your geographic area requires masks or not, though, the CDC wants teachers and students to wear face coverings — masks for students over the age of two. I can see preschool children all across America happily chewing on those wet, slimy masks, and using them as Kleenex.

I’d like to start this post with a caveat that needs to be echoed through schools this fall: According to the CDC, you cannot rely on your mask. Maintaining 6-feet of social distancing remains vital to slowing the spread of the virus, Those masks help. The research shows mask usage slows infection rates. But even the unavailable N-95 is not 100% safe. That “N95” represents an efficiency rating from the National Institute for Occupational Health and Safety: N95 masks filter out 95% of non-oil particles larger than .3 microns. They don’t filter out everything. Many cloth masks out there right now filter out far, far less. There’s a reason why so many articles emphasize masks should be worn to prevent YOU from getting other people sick.

You can’t trust masks. Kids will have to learn the appropriate behaviors for limiting the spread of germs. Reinforcing the need for clean hands and social distancing will be the first priority.

That said, the masks are coming. This post is especially for readers who are still only lightly acquainted with masks. Today’s a good time to begin working on finding the optimal mask. Masks can be even more complicated than shoes. A place to start untangling the mask question: Coronavirus Face Masks: What You Should Know by WebMD.

Flter pocket, nose wire and extra space are items to look for in your mask. Those filters are sometimes sold separately. The nose wire may be unnecessary and even one more thing to mess with on your face — which you are trying to avoid — but the right nose wire will yield a better seal for your mask.

I struggle with masks. I am small enough to shop the children’s section sometimes, and those adult masks often leak. Are you an unusual size? I’d be searching out those larger or smaller masks now, because some of your first attempts may be fails, even epic fails. Definition of an epic fail: It keeps falling off your face.

You want to try out masks and not merely for a half-hour jaunt to the grocery store. Come fall, you will be living in that mask all day if your district decides to go live. Can you do it? Can you do it without going nuts? The wrong mask is like the wrong shoes. You can get into school. You may manage to keep those shoes on when the kids are in the classroom. But you will be thinking about your feet when you should be thinking about metaphors or whatever-your-particular-subject instead.

Masks are a special problem for those of us who wear glasses. If you don’t have a good seal on top by your nose, warm air is guaranteed to fog your glasses. Certain breathing techniques can diminish this fogginess, but a mask that allows your glasses to fog too easily isn’t doing much of a job of keeping your breath in or the outside air out. Here is a place to start your fight against the fog: https://www.fastcompany.com/90486716/how-to-wear-a-mask-without-fogging-up-your-glasses.

If you are not the right size for most masks, you may wish to pull out a needle and thread. You can definitely make your own mask, even if you are not handy with a sewing machine. I searched “youtube video on how to make a covid mask” on Google and got “About 298,000,000 results (0.81 seconds).”  Yep, no shortage of helpful mask makers out there.

And if you create the mask version of a messed-up bedhead, well, you can always hide the mask. I have a large collection of scarves. I have been covering my mask with patterned silk. That adds one more layer to my mask and makes a fashion statement for our times. I just tuck the scarf in on top of my mask and tie it in back. Or drape it over my shoulder like below:

Other tips: Your skin will be oilier and more prone to irritation once you start wearing that mask regularly. You want to avoid products on your skin. Drop the foundation and other products below the mask.

Some doctors suggest you wash your face before putting on and taking off the mask. Well, you do you, depending on your skin type — that much washing would cause me trouble right there — but I’d say most of us should do that cleansing, with the observations that I would want to make sure my hands had already been thoroughly cleaned before I did that wash.

Materials will matter more for some than others, but almost everyone can manage cotton. If you are sensitive to fabrics, I’d research options. https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/making-your-own-face-mask-some-fabrics-work-better-others-n1175966 provides useful information on picking the best fabric. A quick takeaway from that article: “In other words, if the fabric allows for a substantial amount of light to shine through, it’s probably going to allow tiny viral particles through, as well.”

If you wear earrings, life will be easier with hoops. Ties and elastic bands tend to snag on earrings, even posts. Some bracelets can be problematic and bracelets also complicate hand cleaning.

For those who have problems with ties and elastic staying in place, I recommend bobby pins, barrettes and other devices for keeping hair in place. They help keep ties and elastic in place, while potentially spiffing up your look. In Project Runway, they always emphasize that accessory wall! A strategically placed pony tail, braid or bun can also solve the problem of mask drift.

Short-haired guys — is it time to grow your hair out? More hair might make those ties more stable. Of course, due to COVID, a lot of you ARE growing your hair out…

A “don’t raise the bridge, lower the river” approach to the glasses problem: Can you get by with cheaters? Those +2.00 glasses you can pick up at the pharmacy or craft store? I have discovered some frames work better than others. Smaller rectangles fog less often.

You may also wish to add a face shield to your mask. I can’t speak to this shield’s comfort or efficiency, but I liked my mask from this company: https://boomernaturals.com/collections/medical-supplies/products/boomer-anti-droplet-protective-visor-face-shields — the best protection will be a mask/shield combo, but that combo has the potential to be pretty warm, maybe oppressively so in the wrong classroom.

Mask just a tiny bit big? Look up “ear protectors for mask.” This will pull your straps further back, which may be all you need. They look simple to make, too.

Eduhonesty: We can do this. If you missed my previous post, please consider ordering (extra) masks for students. My district has regularly “unexpectedly” run out of supplies as vital as paper. Oops! No paper for late April or May! Then weeks pass as teachers use their own supplies waiting for some purchase order to rescue them. Even if you trust your district to lay in the necessary supplies, I would not be surprised to find administrators underestimated the number of masks required. Preschool and early elementary teachers understand kids in ways that administrators do not. I bet those masks will be great for short games of tug o’ war.

Hugs to my readers.

P.S. Unfortunately, masks and scarves have to be washed. You might put a note in your calendar to remind you to wash face coverings. Like sweaters, I suspect it will be easy to wear those unwashed masks a bit longer than is wise.

This is one of those “I hate this post” posts. Because YOU should arrive at a school with pencils, paper, markers, and all the supplies you require to do your job. But you probably are not that lucky, especially if you work in a poor district. I remember I once got a $250 budget for school supplies from my district. I remember that because I never saw anything like that ever again. Some years I saw over $100. Not infrequently, I bought all my own supplies. I remember the year of red erasable markers. The head of the foreign language department had managed to source thousands and thousands of red markers and a quickly consumed supply of black markers. That was almost all the supply cupboard held all year. I used the red markers for grading, but I could not use them on the whiteboard. Colorblindness is a real thing.

Next year you will want masks and hand sanitizer. I am betting many districts are placing those orders now. But will there be enough masks? Sanitizer? How will you manage the U.S. Clorox wipes crisis when you get to the classroom? A few posts back I wrote about the absurdity of the CDC guidelines for schools. Absurd or not, doable or not, we look to be going forward. So what will you do if there are not enough masks?

For middle and high school, I would lay in a few boxes of those blue masks found in doctors’ offices. Middle school teachers especially might also want to add some smaller masks. You may need back-ups for back-ups. If you are an elementary school teacher, you might do a search on “pediatric masks” or “pediatric surgical masks.” Free hours this summer? YouTube is filled with directions for simple masks. Rocketship and dragon masks could be a fun craft project. You will want baggies for mask storage.

Eduhonesty: I would put the burden for masks on parents, and hope for the best from my school district, but as the old saying goes, “Pray to God, but row for the shore.” We all know those kids who never have a pencil. Maybe that pencil is in a bundle with other supplies under a bed, but whether supplies are purchased or not, they don’t seem to make their way into school classrooms and lockers.

This post was inspired by a colleague who had already ordered her masks and sanitizer. Most teachers do that summer supply shopping. This year, I’d include the COVID supplies and I’d start soon. Personal protective supplies can be hard to find, and sometimes take awhile to arrive.

Hugs to all. I had to close this blog to comments years ago due to trolls, so my feedback tends to be limited to messages from friends on social media. I know many readers are probably groaning or even muttering a choice stream of expletives as they read this, tired of spending so much of their own money to do their job. But row for the shore, readers. When the coughs start, you will want to be sure you have masks.

From my preceding post:

“In the area of unintended consequences, teachers are currently being riffed or nonrenewed all over the country. My social media feed is a sea of men and women who find they have no job. I am certain that many of those teachers whose jobs evaporated are the victim of numbers — the numbers that making superintendents say that schools cannot reopen under the new guidelines because schools cannot afford to reopen. What do you do when you are a district running on financial fumes — as many districts were before the start of COVID-19? You tell newer staff members that they cannot rely upon a job in the fall. Maybe you even tell them they definitely have no job. Districts afraid they cannot afford their busses will cut staff, waiting until fall to determine the absolute minimum amount of classroom coverage they require. Many of the laid-off will be rehired. But right now, they are freaking out all over my social media feeds.”

First, I want to emphasize the penultimate line in the paragraph above: Many of the laid-off will be rehired. That’s riffing. A district dumps teachers to free money for the spreadsheets. Come fall, though, those teachers tend to be called back because student loads don’t allow the district to begin without some, most or even all of those riffed teachers. Keep in mind that riffed teachers are looking for work and not all the riffed will be available to come back, creating possible vacancies. I was riffed four times and I returned every single time.

Now today’s message: Get out there. Start actively looking for the next, better job. You will never find a better time. This is anecdotal but I would put a month’s mortgage money on my belief that panicked districts have been overly aggressive in sloughing staff. I have never seen so many scared, technically or genuinely unemployed teachers at this time of year. On the one hand, that obviously would seem to put a damper on employment searches. On the other hand, in August districts will require teachers. America’s kids haven’t been abducted by aliens. That school that had 1,500 kids last year will almost undoubtedly have 1,500 kids this year. They are likely to look at their numbers and they will know that they still require a full Spanish department or the usual number of 4th grade teachers.

Nonrenewed? Nonrenewals seem to be at an all-time high too. That’s in your favor right now. You will be lost in enough of a crowd so that your nonrenewal will be unremarkable. Get the best recommendations you can. I recommend using colleagues who will enthuse about you if you are concerned about what administration might say.

Be positive. Prepare a set of upbeat answers for why you want to work in District X, Y, or Z. Don’t talk about what went wrong. Talk about what went right and why you love teaching. And go for it!

One possibly large X-factor remains in this equation that should also improve hiring and rehiring prospects this summer: August will reveal a number of unexpected vacancies from teachers sitting on the COVID-19 fence, deciding whether to risk returning to the classroom or not. Not all those teachers will choose to go back into the classroom.

Eduhonesty: Don’t panic. I believe vacancies will be popping up all over. This might be perfect time for the big adventure, the move to Alaska or Hawaii. If you are rooted, don’t be afraid to drive, especially if you enjoy listening to books.

Put on your job hunting shoes and go for it.

P.S. It’s always good to have a couple of answers to those questions about what you can improve upon, something safe like “I would like to improve my management of transitions when changing groups…”