IF...

(with apologies to Rudyard Kipling)

If you can please the Head when all about you
Are losing hope and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when parents doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can teach and not be tired by teaching,
Surviving on four hours of sleep each night;
And work through evenings and the weekends
And still be full of energy and fight;

If you can plan, but not make plans your master;
If you can grade, but not make grades your aim;
If you can meet with Ofsted and the governors,
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to see reports you’ve written
Credited to others in your team;
Or see the mug your mother gave you, broken,
In the staffroom, in the bin;

If you can manage the school’s website
Deal with the crashes, trolls and hacks
Maintain the school’s online presence
Through mass denial of service attacks;
If you can lead your students on a school trip,
And always turn an eye that’s blind;
To tolerate high spirited behaviour,
Returning later, no child left behind;

If you can tweet and post yet keep your virtue,
Nor block or unfollow those who disagree;
if neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
At least not so that anyone can see;

If you can fill that unforgiving lesson
With sixty minutes worth of learning blend,

Yours is the classroom and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a teacher, my friend!

20 November, 2019