Yesterday, I resigned my position as Director of Innovation and Technology for the school district I work for. Immediately, when I tell people that, they ask me the same question: Why are you leaving?
Even if they don’t ask me flat out, I hear the whispers.
Is she being pushed out? (no.) Is she leaving to consult full-time? (no.) She must be making a million on her books. (bahahahahahaha – no.) She’s always talking about depression, maybe she’s losing it. (well, that may be true.)
The decision to leave wasn’t an easy one. It took me weeks of pros and cons lists, talking myself into staying by telling myself I would be an idiot to leave, eventually knowing that it needed to be the right call for me to move on. Rarely, does anyone ask me the one question that I wouldn’t have an issue answering: What made you want to stay?
The comfort of getting a “Good morning” from the tech department ladies without fail when I walked through the door.
Hearing my programmer offer a piece of candy to the students leaving my office that I just had in my office for a stern talking to after throwing their devices across the gym.
Being the people trusted to know secrets from students and providing a safe place for them to be themselves.
Proudly sitting in a mental health meeting and listening to teachers do something about the mental health issues in our district.
Collaborating with one of my favorite people in the world, our library media specialist, knowing that we would come up with an awesome idea and she would act like it was all mine even though I’d know that wasn’t true.
Listening to teachers pop in and out of our department for an opportunity to tell us good news, bad news, funny stories, or just get a piece of candy.
The conversations, the laughter, and the people; that’s what I’ll miss. I never took this job because I thought the technology would keep me engaged. I took this job because I was hopeful that I could create relationships that would make me double and triple-check my desire to leave and I did that. If you asked me what my reason would be to stay it would be the relationships that I worked so hard to create. The ones I’ll talk about long after I’m gone and funny stories I’ll tell my future co-workers about the amazing people I used to work with that almost convinced me to stay.