Teacher tearfully reveals why she left profession

A former Brisbane teacher has revealed on TikTok the traumatic comment that led to her quitting teaching.

A former Brisbane teacher has revealed the reasons why she left the profession. Picture: TikTok

A former Brisbane teacher has revealed the traumatic experiences that led to her quitting teaching in a video uploaded to TikTok last week.

The former educator, who now works as a clothing colour analyst, said a mix of apathy from leaders, students swearing at her and a lack of teaching resources forced her from the classroom.

“Student called me a fat b-tch today, and they will be losing no playtime tomorrow,” the woman, going by the name ‘Colour Babe’ said in the video.

“They said it to a whole group of students and then threatened all the other kids that they would beat them up, choke them, push them. When I asked the leadership team what the consequence would be for this child, the answer was nothing. They won’t be losing playtime, laptop time, free time, anything like that.”

A Queensland teacher has tearfully revealed why she quit the profession. Picture: TikTok

In the second section of the video, she said the leadership team told her not to take sick days during a particular week.

“They said ‘of course you feel sick, have a sick day, but we kind of don’t want you to have sick days because we literally don’t have any budget left’,” she said.

“So if someone is sick your class will get split which then puts pressure on other teachers. They want to have sick days because they’re so overworked and they have 40 children in their class. It’s just a constant spiral.”

@colour_babe

In this video I’m explaining why teachers are quitting schools within Australia. There are many issues within schools in Australia such as lack of respect for teachers increasing workloads lack of resources just to name a few. Teaches are constantly leaving the profession because they’re feeling burnt out not respected And constantly drained. It’s really important that we look after our teachers and provide them with things that they need in order to feel safe supported and valued in their workplace. They also need the resources in order to do their job effectively. It’s time that people start speaking out about what’s going on in schools.

♬ original sound - Colour Babe

She said budget cuts made it difficult to do her job effectively.

“We literally don’t have any resources. I haven’t been given a single thing to help me with my class this year. I haven’t even been given a pen,” she said.

A Queensland teacher has tearfully revealed why she quit the profession. Picture: TikTok

“I asked the school if I could get some books for my students to read. The answer was ‘no, we don’t have a budget’. We don’t have enough laptops, even though we’re meant to teach technology. There’s not enough money in the budget.

“We’re told we’re not allowed to print worksheets anymore. We’re only given a certain amount of paper per term, once you’re out of that paper that’s it, no worksheets anymore.

“With all of this being said, they’re constantly telling us that student grades are declining and that they want to upskill teachers, yet we don’t actually have any resources to implement any of the things we’re being told we need to do.

Holding back tears, the former teacher admitted she needed to leave the profession.

“[I’ve been] thinking for a long time about quitting and whether or not I should make that decision … and I definitely do need to quit,” she said.

In the video caption, she said teachers are feeling “burnt out and not respected.”

“It’s really important that we look after our teachers and provide them with things that they need in order to feel safe, supported and valued in the workplace. They also need the resources in order to do their job effectively. It’s time that people start speaking out about what’s going on in schools,” she wrote.