Noisy, but a Great Place to Work

By Cindy Reitzi

September 2002

As we begin another school year, teachers are arranging space, and finalizing room assignments and desk placements. Veterans are settling into their established nooks; newcomers are stepping in, eager to carve out their own professional space.

For many high school teachers, the “ideal” work space is to have their own room in which to teach and then, during planning hours, away from the noise and interruption of students and colleagues, to “work.” Every high school teacher knows that high schools are not quiet places, so having your own room is a luxury. From this perspective, my space situation last school year as a beginning teacher was not “ideal.” Initially, I might have agreed. Now I think differently.

For the most part, I’m a person who needs quiet to concentrate and think. I have a hard time blocking out noise, especially conversation, since I usually like to join in. In this respect, I have difficulty “working” in a high school environment. Teachers just don’t get their own offices.

This particular high school has always been crowded. Even full-time teachers don’t have their “own” rooms. Plus, English was located in an open room with an extroverted arrangement. The desks of approximately 20 teachers -- essentially the whole department -- were arrayed in various aesthetic angles and sociable groupings of two to three. Next to us, separated by a rickety room divider that kept falling over on the poetry teacher, was Foreign Language – populated by gregarious teachers speaking … foreign languages. They were a happy group and frequently erupted into Latin, French, Spanish, German, and Japanese gales of laughter.

This was my workspace. I was overjoyed to have such delightful, intelligent colleagues in both departments. But I worried that it wasn’t, well, quiet. Could I learn to block out the conversation and noise?

I also worried about my students. I taught freshmen. Since I didn’t have a classroom to myself during planning hours, they would have to come up to my desk in the English office to seek help. Could I coax them up to the foreboding English Department? To a shy beginner, new to high school, not only is the school LARGE, but teachers are scary. It’s one thing to go to an individual teacher for help, it’s another to go into a LARGE roomful of them staring accusingly at you like, “What do YOU want?” Exponentially scarier.

Finally, my last worry as a beginning teacher was the famed territoriality of entrenched veterans and others jockeying for position. Fortunately, in my department I did not encounter the rugged individualist, Manifest Destiny type. These teachers stake out their territories and mark them like pedagogical canines. They cordon off furniture for their own use, especially when forced to share any space. They jealously raise barricades against curriculum poachers encroaching on their intellectual property. In short, these teachers don’t believe in sharing … anything. Not good role models.

It turns out all my worries for my students were unfounded. As time went on, my freshmen happily trickled up to the department to get help. We had a nice nook with large, old-fashioned round oak tables where we could hash out the finer points of writing, interpret a piece of literature, or just talk. It was like talking across your kitchen table, and I think we all found that very comfortable.

My worries about spatial arrangements and auditory disturbances were also unnecessary. The PA system blasting me out of my seat every morning playing the National Anthem was more disturbing than my pleasant colleagues’ voices. The department room arrangement and the personalities of my fellow teachers encouraged a collaboration I would have never enjoyed if I were isolated in my own room with my own thoughts.

The same individualism and independence that many teachers like about teaching can, in turn, make it a deceptively isolating profession. Especially if you never leave your room. Despite the fact that we work with scores of students every day, this seemingly social profession can turn lonely without collaboration. Teachers also need input from other positive professionals to maintain perspective.

While open room arrangements do not automatically guarantee collaboration, it is something I now advocate. My colleagues were open-hearted with ideas and open-handed in sharing materials. I gladly reciprocated. Along with Friday treats and birthday celebrations, this was an essential part of the professional culture there. Before I taught there, other teachers told me that the department not only had a reputation for excellence, but for its professional support of new teachers. By the end of the year, I felt that this collaboration and their excellence were intrinsically linked. And it’s a good reason why they continue to maintain their excellent reputation. In short, it was a great place to “work.”

Posted August 23, 2002