Interview with Gayle Lampf, HIST 150 Spring 2024, Conducted by Brielle Lampf on March 14, 2024

Overview

In this interview, you will be hearing from Mrs. Gayle Lampf, a sixth-grade language arts teacher. Some main themes Lampf explores include technology in the classroom, how a pandemic affected her career, and the differences in how separate generations lead their classrooms. Of course, Lampf talks about more themes than just this like gun violence and her own journey that led her to teach, but these are some of the main points. It is important to note that Lampf will reference curriculums in this interview like a program created by Lucy Calkins, in addition to laws that affect the education system. One example of a law she cites is the No Child Left Behind Act, first implemented in 2001. It was crucial to the interview that Lampf spoke about the No Child Left Behind Act, because while she may have started her teaching career without the act in place, she will leave the education system with it. As Lampf explains in the interview, the act greatly changed the education system in more ways than one. In some ways, the act was good for students and teachers alike, but in other ways, it had long-lasting negative effects in classrooms. You will hear about Lampf’s views on the act in this interview, and why she has reservations about its purpose and true impact. This interview was conducted on March 14, 2024, but the interviewee speaks about her career over the past 20 years, so it covers a wide range of time (1998-2024). Lampf has had a spectacular teaching career, and truly enjoys her job. The insight she provides on education in this interview is unmatched, and provides a true depiction on what the education system is like behind closed doors.

Biography

Gayle Lampf was born on June 24, 1974, as the first child to Albert and Linda Rubino. Gayle is a white, female who uses she/her pronouns. Growing up, Gayle resided in Parsippany, New Jersey with her family. Her parents then had another child, Steven Rubino, who was three years younger. Once entering college, Gayle decided to pursue a degree in elementary education and teaching at Caldwell University. Gayle has taught in the West-Orange School District, and now the Mount Laurel School District where she has been teaching for about 23 years. She is a current language arts teacher to sixth graders though she has taught other levels. Gayle and her husband Jesse, have three daughters together: Brielle (19), Sara (16), and Ashley (14). This interview follows Gayle’s career in education, and all the joys and struggles that go along with the profession. The interview was conducted by Brielle Lampf, Gayle’s eldest daughter.

Research

COVID-19 Effects on the Education System

A study conducted by Courtney N. Baker and her colleagues sought to examine how the pandemic affected teachers’ mood, mental health, and their teaching. The survey was conducted via an online survey that was open to all teachers in the city of New Orleans during a certain period. The survey asked questions pertaining to the beginning of the pandemic and more specifically, teachers’ experiences. One of the questions which most directly corresponds with the purpose of this research asked: “How would you rate your overall mental health since the coronavirus disease pandemic?” and unsurprisingly, most of the answers fell on the higher end of the scale, indicating a more negative effect. What’s most significant that the study found, was that for those teachers who experienced more stressors, they similarly reported that it was “harder to cope” and “harder to teach.” This directly impacts the classroom and the students, and as inferred, the students and teachers then feed off each other’s energy and a negative environment is created. In addition, which is seeming to be more prevalent amongst teachers is that when asked what could be done to help teachers mental health, the second most common answer was support from administration. Since the pandemic, more responsibilities are falling on the teachers, yet there are less teachers than there were prior to the pandemic. Teachers need more help from their administration if they are to have better mental health. Moreover, as other studies have found and as data has shown, more and more teachers have been leaving the profession since the pandemic. Some are retiring early, and some are simply resigning and deciding to start a separate career entirely, just to get out of the field. COVID-19 has had effects on teachers beyond just stress – it is causing some to quit.

What is the No Child Left Behind Act?

The No Child Left Behind Act is a widely talked about law in the education community. Signed in 2002 by President George W. Bush, the law intended for better academic success across the nation. If schools failed to bring students to the expected standard of academic achievement, the federal government could and would, become involved. In addition, the law brought awareness to the fact that the country was trying to level out the disparity across different marginalized groups. In order to measure a schools success, standardized tests were implemented. If students weren’t reaching the goals set for them, the federal government could interfere by shutting down the school, replacing staff, or allowing students to transfer to other schools. Educators were encouraged to teach at faster paces and do anything to ensure the student’s development. There is still much controversy over this law despite the fact that it has undergone more than half a dozen changes since its introduction in 2002.

How Teacher Burnout Has Increased and What Teachers are Saying About It

In an article published by edweek.org, teacher mental health and burnout were examined, in addition to how administrators, districts, and the government treat said teachers. Since the pandemic, and even shortly before then, demands on teachers have been increasing, but these new duties and responsibilities are tedious, and sometimes, unnecessary. Instead of simply teaching children and creating lesson plans, teachers are doing monotonous paperwork, supervising state testing, and even doing emergency sub–coverage due to the decrease in employment. In early January 2023, the EdWeek Research center discovered, “districts’ mental health programming for their employees is sparse” despite the fact that since the 2022–2023 school year, over 50% of respondents in the study revealed that wellness in teachers had declined over the past year. Moreover, another organization known as RAND Corporation, “a nonpartisan research organization,” similarly studied a sample of teachers and their level of burnout. What they found was that “teachers are nearly twice as likely as other working adults to report having difficulty coping with job–related stress, and 10 percentage points more likely to experience burnout.” What’s even more, teachers are leaving the profession at high numbers and those who stay are not enjoying what they do. Their negative feelings towards the job are picked up on by children who are natural empaths, and the decreased wellness becomes a terrible cycle for both student and teacher. An interesting thing to note as well is that with new teachers coming into the profession, there are different outlooks on mental health in general. There seems to be a pattern in which the older generations are less likely to speak of their negative attitudes and mental health struggles, while the younger generations in the profession are placing more of an emphasis on it. Overall, it is clear that with the new academic challenges and behavioral struggles facing students, teachers are now facing their own battles in the classroom too.

Bibliography

Baker, C. N., Peele, H., Daniels, M., Saybe, M., Whalen, K., Overstreet, S., & The New Orleans, T.–I. S. (2021). The experience of covid–19 and its impact on teachers’ mental health, coping, and teaching. School Psychology Review, 50(4), 491–504. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/2372966X.2020.1855473 

(PEER REVIEWED)

Klein, A. (2024, March 13). No child left behind: An overview. Education Week. https://www.edweek.org/policy-politics/no-child-left-behind-an-overview/2015/04

Will, M. (2023, July 19). Here’s what teachers say they need most to manage stress, Mental Health. Education Week. https://edweek.org/teaching–learning/heres–what–teachers–say–they–need–most–to–manage–stress–mental–health/2023/07

https://sites.lib.jmu.edu/sc-interviews/files/2023/03/history.jpeghttps://sites.lib.jmu.edu/scinterviews/files/2023/03/history.jpeg

Transcript

Please note that only the first 30 minutes of the above interview are transcribed. To access the entire interview, audio is required. 

Brielle Lampf 

Okay, hi. So, I’m excited to speak with you. My name is Brielle Lampf. Can you state your name and occupation?  

Gayle Lampf 

My name is Gayle Lampf, and I am a sixth-grade language arts classroom teacher.  

Brielle Lampf 

Ok great. So, firstly, we’re just going to kind of get into your job and the education system as a whole and how it’s developed over the years. So, how long have you been working in education and then, how long have you been at your current job?  

Gayle Lampf 

So, I started teaching in September of 1996. I didn’t enter public education until September of 1998 and in my current position, I have been working in my school district – it’s a public school district – since September of 2001. I took some time off for maternity leave, but you’re talking about 23 years right now.  

Brielle Lampf 

Ok. So, can you talk a little bit about what inspired you to teach? Is it something you’ve always wanted to pursue, or was there a moment that sparked your interest – maybe growing up or later on in life?  

Gayle Lampf  

I think for the most part, I knew I always wanted to do something with children, and I can remember as a little girl wanting to play teacher – that sort of thing. But I think when I was in high school, we took some child development courses. I don’t know if they are still being offered in high schools today, but with those child development courses, I had a really great teacher. I still remember her to this day, Mrs. Tocci. She kind of inspired me to go the route of educating not just because of the course, but because of the way she taught.  

Brielle Lampf 

Is there like – do you think that that class specifically made you want to teach elementary, or did you ever consider teaching [the] high school level?  

Gayle Lampf 

So, funny you should ask because I always thought I would teach younger children. When I did my student-teaching my senior year of college, it was in a third-grade classroom and the first few positions I had were all primary level students. When my husband and I wound up relocating, I just needed a job, and I accepted a long-term position as a sixth-grade language arts teacher. But, in my mind I was saying, oh thank goodness. This is just going to be, you know, a substitute replacement and I can get back to the primary grades and it turned out that I fell in love with middle school kids and middle school teaching, and I can’t imagine going back to the younger kids. This is where I’m supposed to be.  

Brielle Lampf 

So, next I know that you worked in a variety of school districts over the years, and I know that the time you spent in each place varied either with curriculums or levels. Could you speak a little bit about the differences between those schools and then which school you found to be most supportive of you?  

Gayle Lampf 

Well, when I originally started teaching – like I said, it wasn’t in the public school system. And, with that, there was a lot more, I guess the freedoms were very, were there for us to kind of do what we wanted, and I wasn’t experienced, so I was kind of just taking advice from a lot of the veteran teachers – like this is what you should use, this is what you can do, but there wasn’t really any curriculum which was very different from what I had been taught in college. From there, I really wanted to get into the public school system because they offered better health insurance. They offered a better salary, [they] had sick days and personal days. You could start to work towards your pension, so when I started working in the public school system – first, I started teaching basic skills to primary level students and that allowed me to work alongside the classroom teacher and use the curriculums that they were familiar with, and it was pretty simple. I’m just going to talk about the reading [and] language arts portion because that’s what I’ve really been doing for the bulk of my career. We first started off with a whole language curriculum and then from there after a couple [of] years, there was what was called the Basal Reader and there has been research about why those types of curriculums are wonderful, great, and terrific, and also why they’re terrible. I will say that there were components of both those programs that were very positive and then there were some that were negative. Once I entered the current district that I’ve been in since 2001, I do feel that they have been the most supportive. There [are] several people I can reach out to with questions, [who] are willing to help me, but that doesn’t mean that in the past 20 some-odd years, this particular district has gone without changes because I think since 2001, we have gone through 1, 2, – we are currently on our fifth program that we have been using for language arts. So, yeah – a lot of programs that you’ve needed to get to know. There are a lot of advantages to the current program that we’re using, but there [are] also a lot of negative consequences and I’m not going to name the program unless you ask me, but I can tell you that [with] this particular program, there is controversy all over the country about it. The creator has even kind of, I guess jumped ship and started to create her own program. So, I don’t and a few of my colleagues, also kind of do the same thing as me – I don’t know if we would get in trouble for this by our supervisors, but I more or less told them, when you are a veteran teacher, you have to understand you cannot use one program. It’s not a one size fits all. If you want to reach the needs of all of your students, you have to take into consideration that all the programs you’re familiar with need to be used in order to have that child be successful. So, I’ve dabbled in several different curriculums and depending on what my students need, I might take some lessons that I’ve used from years ago and if that’s wrong – so be it. I think that’s one of the nice things about being a veteran teacher. After a while, you just don’t care.   

Brielle Lampf 

I am interested. What’s the program if you can say? You don’t have to.  

Gayle Lampf 

No, no, no. It’s fine. It’s called – the creator is Lucy Calkins. I don’t know who’s actually going to be reading and listening to all of this, but I’m sure if they are in the educational field, particularly with reading and writing, they’ll understand what I mean when I say that it is definitely a controversial program.  

Brielle Lampf 

Huh. That’s interesting. So overall, how have your opinions maybe changed in regard to teaching in the education system and are there any changes you’d feel comfortable talking about that you – that you think have maybe made education better or worse?  

Gayle Lampf 

So, part of the way I’ve viewed education – the reasons why I feel my opinions have changed is because I no longer am that young, fresh out-of-school, adult who wanted to change the world and thought that as long as you have patience and a love for learning, you can teach any child. And, you still hear many people say that and I don’t want to dissuade anybody from going into education, but there unfortunately has – over the years, government has gotten way too involved in the educational system. I understand the reasons for it. We have – public education is funded by taxpayers, so you’re going to need to have your local and state and federal governments get involved in education especially when children are not necessarily meeting the goals that the powers-that-be have set for them. But, it has become increasingly difficult to not complain, not discuss this with others, not to write to your senators and congress people or complain when they are making decisions that they think are going to benefit children, but in the end, they’re really only hurting them. There are people that are making decisions that have never set foot in a classroom. They have no idea what’s going on. I don’t think they’re looking at children as young people. I think they’re looking at them the way you would look at clients in a business. I mean, and education is a business. I mean like I said, you need money in order to have public education funded. But it’s a completely different type of business in that you’re dealing with innocent children – even children in middle school and high school. I mean, they are still children. And you need to take into consideration that there are a lot of underlying factors that go into why they may not be learning at the rate or the depth that our government wants them to.  

Brielle Lampf 

Do you have, like, an example of maybe a change that’s been made either by you know, local governments or the federal government that you maybe don’t agree with that you’d be comfortable sharing or maybe one that you do like? 

Gayle Lampf 

Well, I don’t think that this is a federal government change, but – although it started that way – years ago, I believe it was Kennedy, now not John. F Kennedy for you, okay? But there was a program established called No Child Left Behind. And the ideas at the beginning sounded great. Yeah, you’re going to make sure every child achieves and you’re not going to allow anybody to fall behind and they’re going to continue to move [on] with their classmates, but the fact of the matter remains that we’re all individuals, right? So, we’re all going to learn at different rates. We’re all going to have strengths. We’re all going to have weaknesses. There [are] some – there [are] some subjects that I don’t care what you do, I don’t care what teacher I would have, there is no way I would ever be successful. You know, you put me in astrophysics – I’m not gonna do well. You know, I might learn something, but you know I’m not going to be at the top of the class. This whole philosophy has in turn, it caused so many students to fall between the cracks. I mean, I have students coming to me, sixth graders that can barely read, that don’t understand how to write a coherent sentence. And when parents have even asked, well what about perhaps holding my child back? Well, that is frowned upon. Administrators will tell you studies have shown that holding a child back does more harm than good socially and emotionally. And I can understand that, but at the same time, I remember being in school and there were students when they were younger that were held back. My own uncle was held back in school. And while perhaps it may have bothered him a little bit, I think that children are a lot more resilient than people give them credit for and I think that if more children had been held back, we wouldn’t have these people going into the work force unprepared – not knowing how to even fill out a job application correctly. From what I understand, I could be wrong, but I know that many colleges and universities now are having like, remedial math or reading or writing classes because there are so many students that are graduating high school across the country, but yet they come to college, and they have no idea how to do research correctly or how to write a paper. So, or in math, again not my forte, but I understand there [is] a lot of prerequisites that students are taking in college in order to take the required math classes. And then you have the parents getting annoyed – well why do I have to pay all this extra money? It’s because it all cycles back to this whole No Child Left Behind. You don’t want to leave these children behind so you’re passing them along, but they’re moving along, and they aren’t ready. They’re not academically prepared to be in the classrooms that they’re in. It’s not because they have – they have special needs. It’s not that they require an IEP – an individual education plan. It’s just that they did not have the opportunity to learn at the pace that they needed to be learned, [I mean] they needed to be taught. So that – that’s one problem right there. There [are] probably a ton of other ones. I just can’t think right now.  

Brielle Lampf 

That – that, was definitely – I didn’t. I did not know about that. So, that was interesting. So, moving kind of in a different direction now – so now as a new generation is slowly starting to you know, make its way into education, can you speak about any changes you’ve observed possibly between your generation and then maybe this new generation? It can be positive, negative, neither? You know.  

Gayle Lampf 

When you ask that, are you stating the new teachers that are coming in or the students that I’m teaching?  

Brielle Lampf 

More so the teachers.  

Gayle Lampf 

Okay. So, I’m going to preface this by saying that I am approaching the age of 50 and I readily admit and my friends and colleagues talk about this too, we definitely are becoming a little bit more cynical and I regret to say but I will admit that I’m starting to see a little bit of the older teachers that were in the profession when I first entered – I’m starting to see them in me a little bit. But I can honestly say too though that, I feel as if there are definite concerns with the educators that are entering – the teachers that are entering the education field right now. And I don’t mean to say this as a blanket statement because obviously not every person is the same. I’m just noticing it generally from what I’m seeing in my building. There [are] over 100 staff members in my building where I work and I would say that a good two thirds maybe of – maybe not two thirds – but definitely at least half the building, is age 35 and younger. So, most of the – the people that are in their fifties are now starting to say okay, when can I retire? When can I retire? Where you used to have people in their sixties that were still teaching. And now, most people, they’re out by 60. 62. Unfortunately, I don’t know about other states, but I’m talking here about the state of New Jersey – with our pension plan, there are five different tiers of educators depending upon their pension program and what they will get when they retire. Thankfully, I am tier one which means that based on the age when I started teaching and contributing to the pension fund, and the years’ experience I have, I could potentially retire at age 55 with a decent pension. But those teachers that are perhaps in their late thirties or early thirties or God-forbid their twenties, they’re not going to be able to retire without penalty before the age of 65. And their pension is substantially less than what I will be getting. So, I worry about that for them. I do have some colleagues of mine that are in their thirties, that I mean – they’re looking at what is ahead for them financially. That’ just one thing that they’re looking at that’s concerning them, and they are now putting themselves through college at night because they want to leave education within the next ten years and start another career because they can’t imagine having to work until 65 and then have the retirement plan that they’ll have. They’re burnt out. So, I am seeing that first of all with a lot of the teachers that are coming in. They come in all excited. They’re a little disillusioned. It’s great to see the energy and the positivity they have, but by year three, a lot of them – you can tell they’re burnt out. In the past five years, which of course includes COVID, there have been in my building alone, four people that have resigned and have gone into other fields. I think part of it is because of the requirements that are being placed on teachers. If teachers were to fulfill everything obligation that we are told we are supposed to do, we would not sleep. We would not have weekends. We would not have vacations.

You would essentially need to work around the clock. It is impossible to do it all. You can’t but yet, we’re constantly, we’re having more, and more, and more put on our plate. And then you get this toxic positivity from administration, like – well take care of yourself. You know, be mindful of you and take that break. Oh, but make sure you get your lesson plans in on Monday and make sure you have it with the seventh or eighth different type of lesson plan format that we want you to have and then of course if you get a different supervisor or a different assistant superintendent, they’ll change that too. I do feel that talking to some of my colleagues who are in their twenties and early thirties – there is a different approach to looking at responsibilities as a teacher. In my district, we get ten sick days per year. They can carry over which is obviously positive because God-forbid, you know you have an illness, and you need to be out. But many younger teachers look at those sick days – look at those ten days, they’re mine to use – might as well use them. Why are you keeping them? And I’ve tried to explain for example to my co-teacher, like look you don’t know what’s down the road. You could wind up needing to have your wisdom teeth removed. God-forbid you could wind up in a car accident. We don’t get – we have to pay into our disability, so you want to save those days. That’s why sometimes you know, my children will say, well Mom, just – just stay home if I have like a headache, or a slight cold, but I’m looking at it as, well no. I want to save those days because I don’t know if I’m going to need them or my family is going to need them down the line. Not to mention the fact that doing sub-plans is a nightmare. I don’t know, obviously there are some jobs that people have to do this, but there [is] nothing worse than when you wake up in the middle of the night really sick and you realize you can’t go into work but you better put in emergency sub-plans because there [is] no way that some adult is going to come into the classroom and be able to teach the lesson plans that you have. So, it’s 3:00 in the morning and you’re sick as a dog and you’re putting together lesson plans. That’s another thing too with all these younger teachers that just take days off whenever they want. There [are] not a lot of people going into education so there is a definite shortage of teachers. There is a definite shortage of substitute teachers. I can’t tell you how many times a week I get called to do emergency sub-coverage because there [is] not enough of teachers in the building. And then I see what some of the younger teachers leave for plans and it just blows my mind. Like, I’ll have a teacher write like, have a conversation with the students about the solar system. That, that’s what you’ve left for your substitute? I get the whole casual work-force thing. You know, people wearing jeans to work. I wear jeans to work, but I find it really disrespectful when – I was just in a department meeting this week and there were two teachers probably in their late twenties, that were sitting there and they had their foot up on a chair and they were chewing gum and blowing bubbles as the supervisor was talking. I just, I’m blown away. Like, really? This, this is acceptable? So, it’s little things like that they don’t seem to have – hold the same regard to with their students? I know a lot of it is experience. The more you have, the better you are at it, but I’m noticing a lot of younger teachers that just want the students to be their friends and they’ve got no control. And I don’t really remember having those issues when I first started teaching. Some of the issues I had were, you know, overplanning or under planning or trying to get ahead on my grading or getting prepared to be observed. Where I think the major problem that a lot of the younger teachers or the non-veteran teachers have is how to manage the classroom. Part of that could be – they’re not getting the training that they should be getting. Probably all colleges and universities have different programs, but I feel like a lot of times these young teachers are kind of just, they get hired and are thrown to the wolves and there [is] no support for them.   

Brielle Lampf 

Wow.  

Gayle Lampf 

Sorry, I know I was really talking.  

Brielle Lampf 

No, no, no. It’s perfect. It’s perfect. You actually made me think about you know, just thinking more about the non-veteran teachers – it made me think a little bit about just in terms of different generations. I don’t think I’ve asked you about it. Have – can you speak a little bit about maybe technology? Did you come in with technology? (Gayle laughs) If you did, what was it like? If not?   

Gayle Lampf 

You’re smiling because you already know some of the things I’m going to say.  Well, so when I first started teaching, we didn’t even have desktops in the classroom, let alone Chromebooks or laptops or anything like that. And, it was a really big thing when each teacher was given a desktop to use. This was like oh wow. Oh my gosh. How exciting? And yes, it was – it was definitely a learning curve, but I do remember at that time upper administration being very patient with us – all of us. And you know, I was younger at this time too, like late twenties – like teaching us how to use certain programs and what was expected in terms of grading. And we actually really embraced it because it allowed for us to use certain platforms that are out there and students and with the age I teach, parents, really couldn’t argue with you over a grade – like you know, the program showed it to you. Here it is. This is [it], you know, if you have questions, I can show you how the program has determined that this is the score your child has earned, but there really isn’t as much room for error, so that’s – that was a beautiful thing. I think, and I can only speak for my district here, I think that in some cases because there are so many different ways you can teach people using technology now – I mean, it’s [the] 21st century. I mean you cannot, you cannot teach children without using technology. You’re doing them a disservice, so my district in particular is always, like looking for the newest, latest trends and I feel like sometimes, they’re always kind of jumping on the bandwagon. Well, now we’re going to try this. And now we want you to implement this in your classroom and you know I can remember years ago when you know, PowerPoint was like all the rage. And you know, you have to present everything with PowerPoints. I was like, okay fine. And you know, we’re all learning how to do it and there were certain things I got very excited – like oh my gosh, I finally figured this out. And not three years later, at some in-service, a principal said, well come on people, PowerPoint is really PowerPointless, don’t you think? I don’t want to see any of my teachers using PowerPoints if I come in for a lesson. You better hope I don’t see that. So, then it was like – okay, well what do you want us to do? And, well if you really want to engage the kids, you could be using like Bitmojis and you could be using this and they’re all about making it entertaining for the kids. And being really showy. Don’t forget to put your website out so parents and families can see. And, don’t forget you have to learn this new part of the grading system that we have with PowerSchool and – but, they’re not taking the time for us to learn the program effectively. And by the time we’re figuring this out, which by the way, is taking away from our lesson planning and reviewing data and grading papers and making those connections with the kids, by the time we do figure that out, they’ve moved onto something else. So, I feel like a lot of time is lost and I feel like a lot of money is wasted. I mean, you know people constantly are saying, where is the money going that we use in our taxes for school? A lot of it is wasted. I mean, if you knew the probably millions of dollars in materials that have been thrown out after just eight to ten years – thrown out, you’d be sick because oh, this is a better program. Probably because some huge guru from some ivy league school came up with a new way to teach kids and this is the best way to do it – it’s all cyclical. It always comes back. Sorry, I just get kind of passionate.