After the longest term, the Christmas holidays are nearly upon us: a time to hang up your whiteboard marker and rediscover your loved ones.
And if all those Channel 5 films are to be believed, Christmas is also the peak time for romance. Is it really Christmas if you don’t run through the snow to fling yourself on the object of your desire?
Sadly, for too many teachers, the romance this year will be confined to the TV. The job brings many casualties, and your love life might just be one of them.
Messing up your love life
I recently stumbled across a thread on social media in which one teacher bemoaned the fact that nobody talks about the difficulties of trying to date. She was instantly inundated with scores of teachers sharing stories of how the job has messed up their love life.
“Is this true?” I asked a younger, single colleague. “Absolutely,” she said. “I’ve given up. Once term starts, you simply don’t have the time or energy for dating.”
Has the job really taken over this much? Have teachers become the new undateables?
When you think about it, it’s not that unlikely. It’s not the easiest job in which to meet people. Wherever you work, the chances of finding someone you might possibly be attracted to are limited. In many schools, simply finding someone of your preferred sex is a tall order.
It’s also not the most sociable of jobs, and starting a relationship with a colleague is hardly risk-free. What happens if it all goes pear-shaped?
The perils of digital-savvy pupils
Once you’ve ruled out dating options among your work colleagues, there’s always the internet. Around one in three relationships in the UK now starts online.
But online dating brings with it added dangers when you’re a teacher. A 2017 report from online-safety organisation Digital Awareness UK found that more and more teachers were being victimised online by digital-savvy pupils. In one case, pupils had found their teacher’s Tinder profile and created fake accounts to entice her into a “date”, before photographing her being stood up for the whole school to see.
Assuming you can successfully navigate the dangers to embark on a new relationship, how hard do you have to work to make sure the job doesn’t get in the way?
Teachers are not the most available of people. We can’t respond to texts during the working day, we’re a non-starter when it comes to spontaneous minibreaks, and going out on a school night is not something we undertake lightly.
The job doesn’t just eat into your free time, it eats into your mood. It’s hard to be emotionally available when you’re still replaying this afternoon’s disastrous lesson in your head.
Second fiddle to a pile of marking
New partners don’t appreciate playing second fiddle to a pile of marking. And romantic dinners are not supposed to end with your date searching through the recycling for the champagne cork, to use in their lesson on floating and sinking.
Maybe the solution is just to date other teachers. At least they understand the pressures, the exhaustion, the necessity of holidaying at peak prices. I know plenty of teachers happily partnered up with other teachers. But then who makes dinner? Do they spend the holidays batch cooking half a term’s worth of lasagne for the freezer?
And, even when you do get a date, is it safe? Are you going to run into parents or sixth-formers? Are you prepared to risk public displays of affection in an age of cameras and social media?
But, this Christmas, I would encourage single teachers not to give up on dating entirely. Whichever way you look at it, teachers are a real catch, and our partners are lucky to have us. Just ask Mr Brighouse.
Jo Brighouse is a pseudonym for a primary teacher in the West Midlands. She tweets @jo_brighouse
