Teachers in Transition – Episode 233: Prioritize, Reflect, and Thrive – Reclaiming Confidence in Changing Times

In this episode of Teachers in Transition, Vanessa Jackson reflects on the often underestimated impact educators have on their students and communities, even when the recognition doesn't come immediately. She shares a personal story of reconnecting with a former student, realizing the lasting effect her teaching had – even when it wasn’t best teaching. Vanessa encourages teachers to recognize their contributions and the ripple effects of their work, regardless of the challenges they face in the education system.

Job Hack: Using Music to Manage Transitions in the Classroom Vanessa introduces practical ways to incorporate music into classroom routines to ease transitions and improve the overall atmosphere. She offers tips for both elementary and secondary school educators:

Career Transition & Job Search Tips for 2025 Vanessa provides three essential pieces to jumpstart your job search for 2025 focusing on preparation, navigating job boards, and some emerging job trends. 

Vanessa encourages listeners to take actionable steps, such as updating their LinkedIn profile or researching niche job boards, to make 2025 a successful year for their career transition.

Helpful Links:

• The Twilight Zone - "The Changing of the Guard" Episode
• Sample Classroom Transition Songs for Elementary Teachers (Link to Vanessa's resource)

·         Industry Specific job boards and More Niche Job Boards

• A Free Discovery Session with Vanessa 

Takeaway Challenge: 
Take one actionable step this week towards their career goals

o   Update your LinkedIn Profile

o   Research an new career field that you find interesting. 
 whether that’s updating your LinkedIn profile or researching an emerging 

Connect with Vanessa:

• Email: teacherintransitioncoaching@gmail.com
• Voicemail/Text: 512-640-9099

·         Follow Teachers in Transition on Facebook!

·         Connect with me on Blue Sky: @beyondteaching.bsky.social

·         Connect on LinkedIn

Don't forget to subscribe, share the podcast, and leave a review. Let's make 2025 your best year yet!  Send your comments, stories, and random thoughts to me at TeachersinTransitionCoaching@gmail.com!  I look forward to reading them.  Would you like to hear a specific topic on the pod?  Send those questions to me and I’ll answer them. 

The transcript of this podcast can be found on the podcasts’ homepage at Buzzsprout.

Transcript

Are you a teacher who is feeling stressed out and overwhelmed? do you worry that you're feeling symptoms of burnout - or are you sure you've already gotten there? Have you started to dream of doing something different or a new job or perhaps pursuing an entirely different career - but you don't know what else you're qualified to do? You don't know how to start a job search and you just feel stuck. If that sounds like you, I promise you are not alone. my name is Vanessa Jackson; and I am a career transition and job search coach and I specialize in helping burnt out teachers just like you deal with the overwhelmingly stressful nature of your day-to-day job and to consider what other careers might be out there waiting for you. You might ask yourself, What tools do I need to find a new career?  Are my skills valuable outside the classroom?  How and where do I even get started?  These are all questions you deserve answers to, and I can help you find them.  I’m Vanessa Jackson. Come and join me for Teachers in Transition.  

***Hi!  And Welcome back to another episode of Teachers in Transition. I am your host, Vanessa Jackson – I’m a career transition and job search coach who specializes in helping educators just like you. I am here today to help you reflect a little bit on the past year, and to look forward with an eye on the future!  I can help you figure out how to translate your teaching skills into skills for your next career. I provide tips and suggestions to help with stress and mental health, hacks to help your day, and job-hunting tips.  Today on the podcast, we talk about just how many people you’ve reached over the past year and beyond, in our job hack section we talk about using music as a tool for managing transitions, and in our job search segment, I go over three vital tips to jumpstart that job search in 2025!
 
 I think that sometimes we underestimate just how many people we affect in our lives.  There’s the obvious ones like the interactions we have everyday – family, friends, students, cashiers at the stores.  Then there are the countless other interactions that we don’t think about as much – people we pass by in those stores, traffic, or on the street. It’s our students that get most of our attention, and I know I wasn’t the only one who used to wonder some days why I bothered at all.
 
 There is an episode of an old TV show called, The Twilight Zone, about teachers titled "The Changing of the Guard," which is Season 3, Episode 37. The Twilight Zone was a show created on a shoestring budget. If you go back and watch it now, you can feel like they were almost making it in somebody's garage—very few characters, very simple sets. But the storytelling was so compelling that nobody noticed the lack of everything else.

In this particular episode, we meet a teacher who goes into his school one day and is brought into the headmaster's office. He is very summarily dismissed—not even a thank you for your service. He protests, saying that his life has been his teaching – he’s been there over 50 years. But they simply reply with a cold “Thank you. Time for a new guy. Later, bye.” He becomes very despondent, calling into question everything he’s ever been and everything he’s ever done. He questions the merit of his entire existence.

This episode is a little A Christmas Carol-esque in that when he goes home, he is greeted by the ghosts of students past, all of whom have gone on to do good things in the world. They’ve all become productive citizens - or at least the ones who appear in ghost form. They talk to him about the difference he made in their lives.

And so it is with you. You’ve made more of a difference than you think, even though we often never stop to consider it. If you think back, there’s likely a teacher who affected you positively in one way or another. You think about that teacher with great fondness. But does that teacher know you feel that way? I’d say there’s a better than 50/50 chance they don’t. Because we don’t tend to hunt down all of our teachers from years gone by to say thank you. Often, it’s only later in life we realize, "I had no idea what a good job you were doing."

For me, I think back to some of my high school science teachers. They really had it going on. I’ve never reached out and thanked them and I wouldn’t know where to find them now.  It’s fascinating to look at things through that lens now. My first year of teaching was as a substitute teacher before I had a teaching certificate, and to put it mildly, I was winging it. I’ve always been very good at breaking tasks down and saying, “Well,  do A, you need to do B. To do B, you need to do C. Okay, let’s start with that first.” But I was absolutely winging it in a classroom that had already gone through 10 substitutes before I got thereI ended up being there for the rest of that school year.

As my career progressed and I learned a lot more, I used to wish I could go back and apologize to every kid in that class for the things I did not yet know. Then, one day, I got pulled over while driving. The police officer came up and said, “Do you know why I pulled you over?” And I replied, “Absolutely no idea.” She said, “Well, you have a brake light out.” I said, “I guess that’s going on my list of things to take care of today.”

She took my driver’s license, which at that point was from out of state because we were stationed in Alaska, and I was visiting my hometown. She went back to her vehicle, then returned and said, “I know you.” I looked at her and asked, “Is that a good thing or a bad thing?” She replied, “I was in your band class.” Suddenly, it clicked. Lauren, my clarinet player from that first class, came into focus.

She had a new last name, but as soon as she mentioned band class, all the pieces came together. She told me about the lessons I had taught her, which - fascinatingly enough - had very little to do with playing the clarinet and everything to do with tenacity, grit, and sticking to things. We talked about her kids, one of whom was very interested in band, and how she was going to make sure they joined. In that moment, I realized that even though I might not have been the best band director on the planet at that time, I had made a difference. And it was a  positive difference.

We all do the best we can with what we have. So, consider the impact you’ve made and the ripples you’ve sent out into the world that you may never know about because you were a teacher. And No, this doesn’t make any of the horrible things going on in education okay. It doesn’t mean you have to stay if you’re ready to go. But as we close out this calendar year, I want you to understand what an amazing job you’ve done, how hard you’ve worked, and how much it has mattered. Even if you don’t ever know exactly how much that was.
 
 And I ‘ll leave with a quote I’ve used before from the old TV show, Xena, Warrior Princess:  Xena and her new friend Gabrielle are talking about how our experiences affect us. Xena throws a rock in a lake and points out that the stone makes the water ripple and churn.  Gabrielle points out that if you wait long enough, the ripples fade and the lake goes back to a state of calm.  And Xena says, “But the stone’s still under there.  It’s now part of the lake.  It might look as it did before, but it is forever changed.”
 
 To be fair, their conversation is about the chaos in Xena’s soul, but this metaphor also speaks to how we’ve made a difference even when we can’t see it.  The stone of our influence has forever changed the lakes of those with whom we interact. 

And in today's hack - our hacks are designed to help your life in one way, shape, form or fashion.  Today we are going to talk about your professional life.  As we come back from the break, the children often return relatively feral and/or on completely different sleep schedules. Some aren’t even fully awake until well after lunch! So, this is a wonderful opportunity to add routines that will make your life easier in the long run. Today’s hack is to use Music.  Music can be a powerful tool in the classroom, helping to set the tone, ease transitions, and create a sense of routine.

But how you use it might depend on whether you’re teaching elementary or secondary students. Here are some hacks tailored for both settings:

If you’re working with elementary school kids, it is really useful to use music to mask transitions. Think Barney the Dinosaur. Now, I know Barney gets a lot of flack—there’s even a joke made by one of the Blue-Collar Comedy comedians about how the dinosaurs went extinct because they didn’t want to hang around Barney anymore. But there is no denying this classic "Clean up, clean up, everybody, everywhere” was a brilliant use of music as a routine. I think most of us can still sing that song today!  I think that little ditty will long outlive the television show. Here are some specific suggestions: 

Start the Day with a Welcome Song: Choose a cheerful, repetitive song that signals the beginning of the day. It not only puts students in a positive mindset but also helps late-comers transition smoothly into the class.  You can re-write the words to common children tunes or use a playlist of happy tunes already written.  I made up a few for my elementary teacher friends which will be linked in the show notes.

Use Cleanup Tunes: Select a 2-3 minute upbeat track for clean-up times. When students hear the song, they know it’s time to wrap up and reset for the next activity. This is especially effective because it turns an instruction into a fun, predictable event.

Chill Music for Quiet Time: Incorporate instrumental or soft music for calming students down after recess or before quiet activities. It can help regulate energy levels and create a peaceful atmosphere. If you have naptime, consider some of the slower music from symphonies.  The 1st movement from Beethoven’s 7th comes to mind.  

Write Your own Lyrics! You can rewrite the words to simple tunes like "Clementine" or "The Wheels on the Bus." Use these to signal transitions like coming back from lunch and settling into the afternoon routine. The specific words can vary, but the power lies in the consistency and simplicity of the melody.  I have a link in the show notes where I wrote out a few for you to get you started! 

One of the hardest things to manage in middle and high school is transitions - kids moving through hallways and arriving at your classroom can create chaos. If you have a song playing when they walk in, it sets the tone. While the song is playing, students can get their materials out, settle into their seats, and start their bell ringer or opening prompt. As the music fades, you can transition seamlessly into the next part of your lesson. Over time, this becomes a cue you don’t even have to give - it’s built right into your routine. 

You can use Music as a Timer: Use short, high-energy songs to signal the end of group work or individual assignments. For instance, “You have until the end of this track to finish up!”

Use music as a Mood Setter for Lessons: Play theme-appropriate background music as students settle into the next topic. For example, use instrumental movie soundtracks to create an immersive experience during history or literature classes.

Music makes a great End-of-Class Wrap-Up: Play a particular song every day at the end of class to signal the day’s wrap-up. This creates consistency and gives students a subtle cue to reflect and organize.

Regardless of the age group, consistency is key. Music should act as a routine signal, so choose tracks thoughtfully and use them repeatedly for the same transitions. Once your students are trained to respond to these cues, the classroom flow can become seamless and even enjoyable. Build it in and see how it works for you. You might be surprised at how much music can shift the energy in your classroom
 
 And moving on to our Career Transition and Job Search segment today, Let’s "Jumpstart Your Job Search 2025." Whether you’re looking for your next big opportunity or taking your first steps into a new career field, here a few tips to help you make this year your year. 

Tip 1: Preparing for a Job Search

If you’re anything like me, you want to hit the ground running. But here’s the thing - if you’re running in the wrong direction, you’re not getting closer to the goal. Preparation is the key.

So, let’s talk about five things you need to do before you start firing off resumes:

1. Update Your Resume Take a fresh look at your resume and ensure it reflects who you are today, not just who you the last time you made it. Highlight recent accomplishments, add new skills, and focus on the results you’ve achieved. Numbers and metrics speak volumes – potential employers love to see how you’ve made an impact.  They want to know about what you’ve owned and how that can help them make money or save money. 
2. Clean Up Your Online Presence Google yourself. Yes, really. Make sure your LinkedIn profile is polished, professional, and aligned with your resume. And while you’re at it, check your other social media platforms to ensure they’re presenting the best version of you. No one needs to see those rants from 2017. And some of us like to keep things real so we don’t post purely positive my-life-is-perfect sorts of posts, but you’ll want to guard against having too many negative ones in a row – that’s just not attractive to a potential employer.  If your resume interests a company, they’ll check your LinkedIn.  If they get serious about you (and if it is a role where this might matter), they’ll check out your social media too. 
3. Clarify Your Career Goals What are you looking for? Take some time to identify the roles, industries, or companies that interest you. A focused search saves time and helps you land somewhere that truly fits. It makes it easier to tailor your resumes when they’re all in the same general direction. 
4. Gather Your Tools: Have that ChatGPT account set up to save you some time when parsing job descriptions, set up a professional email address (if you haven’t already), and consider using tools like job trackers or templates for applications. Preparation will save you precious time later.  This is something I help my clients with. 
5. Build a Routine Job searching can feel overwhelming if you don’t manage your time. Having a routine or some set tasks can make it easier to do. Set aside dedicated time each day to search, apply, and/or network. Put it on your calendar, or list, or whichever system works best for you.

Tip 2: Navigating Online Job Platforms

Online platforms are where most job searches begin these days, but not all job boards are created equal. Here the five ‘biggie’ platforms that everyone tends to drift towards first. 

1. LinkedIn – It’s the gold standard for networking and job hunting. Use LinkedIn’s advanced search features to filter roles by location, industry, or experience level. Bonus: Set up job alerts so opportunities come to you.
2. Indeed – Still one of the largest  boards out there. Use its resume upload feature and keyword optimization to make sure your applications get noticed.
3. Glassdoor –  This is great for not only finding jobs but also researching company culture, salary expectations, and reviews from current and past employees. Knowledge is power, my friends!
4. AngelList – Ideal for those interested in startups or tech roles. This platform connects you directly with company founders or hiring managers.
5. Industry-Specific Boards – Almost every field has niche job boards. Actually, there’s a lot of location =-specific ones too. There are so many, that I have a couple of articles linked in the show notes that list them. There are boards for everything you can think of! 

Pro Tip: Use applicant tracking system (ATS) keywords in your resume and cover letter to align with the job descriptions on these platforms. Remember, Many applications are screened by bots before they even reach a human.

Tip 3: Trends to Watch in 2025

The job market is constantly evolving, and staying ahead of the curve can give you a competitive edge. Here are some trends to keep on your radar as you jumpstart your 2025 job search.

1. It’s a hard market for job seekers.  This is why is so important to have a strategy for your job search instead of just scrolling LinkedIn and clicking APPLY when something seems vaguely interesting.  Overall, the market is in an odd place.  As an example, remote jobs are declining. They’re still higher than they were before the pandemic, but more and more companies want their people back in the office HOWEVER, several of these companies don’t even have enough office space for everyone to come back. People who are flexible will go farther. 
2. Skills-Based Hiring More employers are shifting away from traditional degree requirements and focusing on skills. Highlight certifications, online courses, or hands-on experience that demonstrate your capabilities.
3. The Tech Industry  is poised to make a comeback, but they’re prioritizing quality over quantity. And the best way in may be as a contractor.  It appears that leaders will be prioritizing outside contractors as a money-saving measure.
4. AI and Tech Integration Artificial intelligence is reshaping how businesses operate. Even if you’re not in tech, familiarity with tools like ChatGPT, data analysis software, or digital marketing platforms can give you a leg up.  AI is going to open tech positions in other areas like finance. Become an AI Whisperer to set yourself apart from the crowd.  Invest in yourself by learning more about AI.
5. Jobs on the rise include Accountant, Data Scientist, Cyber Security (those hackers NEVER give up!).  Customer Service jobs are also on the rise – these sound scary, but often, it’s easier than angry parents and you might even move into another area of the company once they get to see your skillz in action. 

Job searching can be daunting, but with preparation, the right tools, and an understanding of emerging trends, you can approach 2025 with confidence. My challenge for you this week: Take one actionable step—whether that’s updating your LinkedIn profile, identifying a niche job board, or researching an emerging industry (I vote for AI).

Remember, every step forward brings you closer to your goals. You’ve got this! And as always, if you have questions or need more guidance, feel free to reach out. 

If you are stuck in your job search, or are having trouble getting started, reach out to schedule a complimentary discovery session with me to see how I can help you pivot careers and leave education.  What possibilities await you in the coming new year?  Will you survive or thrive in 2025?  
 
 Remember that if you are thinking of leaving the classroom that these searches generally take longer than the three-month teacher shuffle you are used to. It’s best practice to start early because it can take 4-9 months to get a job and another 1-2 months to get through the interview and onboarding process.  This varies by the field you’re looking in, but it is definitely different than the teacher shuffle. Now is a great time to get started. I’ll see you in the next episode. Until then, keep growing, keep learning, and keep transitioning!

Let’s make 2025 your best year yet!

That’s the podcast for today! If you liked this podcast, tell a friend, and don’t forget to rate and review wherever you listen to your podcasts. Tune in weekly to Teachers in Transition where we discuss Job Search strategies as well as stress management techniques.  And I want to hear from you!  Please reach out and leave me a message at Teacher in transition coaching at gmail dot com.  You can also leave a voicemail or text at 512-640-9099. 

I’ll see you here again next week and remember – YOU are amazing!