I was recently in an online argument about work and people were making some wild statements about 80 hour work-weeks. For example it was said that:
1) Many attending physicians work 80-hour weeks
2) Many people in other professions such as high school teachers work 80-hour weeks
Let me just say that it is not easy to work an 80-hour week. Yes, I often did this in residency, but that's because I took night call. If I did two 30-hour shifts that week, it wasn't that hard to reach 80 hours. That's why physicians can work that many hours fairly easily. Because we work nights.
As far as I know, high school teachers do not take overnight shifts. Yes, they do grading or lesson plans at home, but probably not through the entire night. So that would require working roughly 12 hours a day, every single day, including weekends. So in real time:
If you arrived at school at 7:30AM every morning and had maybe 30 mins of commuting time, you would have to work straight until 8PM every night. No playing with your kids, sitting down for dinner, television, just come home at work till 8PM. And same deal on both Saturday AND Sunday, working from 8AM to 8PM with no breaks. Are there high school teachers that do this? Because I highly doubt it.
There are definitely other professions that require that 80 hour per week commitment. Investment banking, some consulting jobs, being a lawyer, working in politics, state dept. High school teacher is not one of those jobs.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes -- they reach 80 hours because they are pulling all-nighters too. I agree it's pretty hard to do unless that is going on.
DeleteYeah, my friends who are i-bankers definitely work 80 hours a week.
DeleteI'm a lawyer and frequently work 80 hours a week (but not always, otherwise I'd probably kill myself). I am tethered to my computer and blackberry 24/7/365. I freely admit I have no life outside of work.
ReplyDeleteLesson of the day to all you young kids out there: for the love of god, don't go to law school.
And OMDG, thanks for appreciating that people other than doctors work crazy hours. My rheumatologist just rolls her eyes when I tell her the hours I work and once even told me in a very condescending manner that the lawyers she knows don't work that hard. I had to laugh at that and answered yeah, well, my endocrinologist only works Mon-Thur, 10 to 4, so I guess all physicians must work those hours. That stopped her snarking for a while.
And I only tell her the number of hours I work because she asks the question. It's not a piece of info that I would otherwise be inclined to share with her. It is so irritating.
No, I believe lawyers work those hours too. I know several lawyers in private practice who come home at midnight several nights a week and come in during weekends. I can't say the same for high school teachers.
DeleteThank you for recognizing that. Sometimes it seems that you and ODMG are the only ones that do.
DeleteAnd let's not forget the less fortunate who have no choice but to work two (or more) low wage jobs to make ends meet, and who probably earn work as much or more than we do for a small fraction of what we make. I know that as much as I have to bust my ass for my job, at least I am lucky enough to earn a decent living.
That's a bummer that you don't have more teacher friends. They're pretty grounded, thoughtful and caring people.
ReplyDeleteThis is to answer you saying "I can't imagine that..." and "I don't know any reason why..." rather than to be critical.
High school teachers definitely can work 80 hr work weeks. It seems you don't realize that some early morning electives, sports or other club coaching roles, start at around 6:15AM so the teacher has to be there earlier to prepare at perhaps 5:30, and may well come on weekends for practice, or chaperone traveling events for several 24hr periods. Then, it seems you're assuming they go home at 5. I know an /elementary/ school teacher who doesn't even leave work until 7:30 or 8PM at night because of grading, curriculum plans, meetings with other teachers or administrators, and then she has an hour commute because it's hard to find teaching jobs right now. And in case you're wondering why she was there until 7:30 grading, don't forget that public schools act as childcare for people who can't afford childcare or who are in dangerous situations, and so there are after-school programs as well as additional club activities that go until late in the evening that require the teacher's attention and involvement, which means they can't even start to do grading or paperwork or faculty-only-meetings until after the children or teenagers leave at 5 or 6.
Now, I'm a medical student now, so I can see first hand how doctors get intense brain work and long hours and have lives on the line. Teacher's may not have someone's immediate live-or-die dilemma to worry about but they certainly have the shape of people's lives in their hands, and for longer durations of their lives, and long long hours.
I firmly believe there is not so much a comparative amount of more than 40-hrs per week of overwork, but rather a threshold of overwork. Doctors and teachers and lawyers regularly exceed that threshold in individual cases.
I have some teacher friends. Actually, soon after I saw the comment, I met up with an elementary school teacher friend of mine, and asked her about it. She thought 80 hours a week was a huge overestimate.
DeleteI don't know any high school teachers, except... oh yeah, my mom was one! I'll ask her right now, since she's right next to me. She was a biology teacher and says including grading, it was maybe 50 hours a week tops. Sometimes she worked more, but she says it was more voluntary enrichment (i.e. learning more about a topic she thought would be interesting to teach).
What you said in your last paragraph makes sense. I'm sure there are some teachers that exceed the threshold of 80 hours, but I suspect those are cases of poor time management or putting in extra hours to make more money. And it's probably far fewer than... let's not even say physicians, but people who work in fields that require on call or overnight duties.
As a daughter of a high school teacher myself, I have never seen my mother work 80 hours a week. She has around 6 hours of school in the mornings, and no afternoons whatsoever (if a HS teacher puts on afternoons, they usually get one morning free: by law they have a maximum of 20 lective hours here). She is dedicated to her job, so she puts 2-3 hours in the afternoon, into grading and such. That is, about 40 hours a week. I have never, ever, in my whole life, seen her put an 80 hour week.
DeleteI don't consider sport coaches to be teachers (here a sport coach is not a gym teacher, and gym teachers get normal hours), and anyways, they don't work normal school hours, here they usually work only afternoons. It is usually only primary schools those that get daycare. No high schools here get any babysitting service. And jobs on the side (say, teaching at an academy) don't count (if a doctor works at a hospital in the morning and at a private clinic in the afternoon, that is not a job requirement, that is 2 jobs and should count as something different).
While I am sure a lot of professions get heavy hours, high school teachers don't. I have met quite a few, and, given some exceptionary dates (1 school trip a year with 2 teachers)... No 80 hours at all.
The spouse is a middle school teacher, who was putting in about 65 hours a week the first year of teaching IF (and only if) you include the rather long commute. Plus, first year teachers don't have any of last years tests/lesson plans, so that took longer than it does now. Now, it is probably about 50-55 (including commute time, we moved). And I know part of the reason it takes longer is spouse tends to not always be as efficient as possible (watch the basketball game, crazy things in other class rooms, watch TV while grade at home, etc). If spouse was more efficient, it would probably only be 45-50.
DeleteSo, I agree. No 80 hour weeks. Still a very important job.
Dear Dr. McFizz,
ReplyDeleteIt's not so much your "wrongness," but your presumptuous attitude that makes me ALMOST want to dismiss this silly little blog post and move about my day. But, I’m so sick of this attitude about teachers. "Yes, doctors, lawyers, and bankers (who all make much better money than teachers, and somehow - I'm looking at you bankers! - often get more respect than teachers) can work 80 hour weeks. But teachers can't possibly work that many hours. Because it doesn't seem reasonable. Because it doesn't. Because my mom said so." Did the author think about the time that teachers put in AT HOME? I'm not saying that all teachers put in 80 hour weeks every week, but as someone who has been teaching for a few years, I can tell you that it isn’t nearly as uncommon as the author implies.
AND another thing! A teacher who takes on extra responsibilities outside her regular hours CHOOSES to work more time (thus effectively “nullifying” the extra hours they work in the author’s mind), while a lawyer, doctor, banker who takes on additional responsibilities is simply acting within the realm of his/her job description? Do you see the bias that you expose in that assertion? Not only that, but it shows that you have NO CONCEPT of the responsibilities that teachers have that lie OUTSIDE their official job description.
AND another thing (and this is personal, so forgive my language), F*** you for assuming that a teacher who can't get her/his work done in fewer hours has a time-management problem! That is an unbelievable example of outright condescension. Increasingly, teachers have upwards of 50 kids (sometimes more!) in their classes. If they have 5 periods per day (some have 6 and others have 7 a day, but I'll just stick with 5), that's 250 kids. A GOOD teacher provides activities and assessments that stimulate the minds of the students, and are not scan-tron, fill-in-the blanks. There are essays, short answers, creative works, presentations, etc. that the teacher must read/observe, then reflect on and carefully craft comments and suggestions for EVERY STUDENT in the class. Do you have any concept of how long this can take?!
Not to mention the fact that more and more teachers are taking on the role of counselor for their students, since schools are cutting more “non-essential” personnel every year.
I could go on like this for much longer, but you see, I have hours of grading and preparations to do at home this weekend. Wait, are you surprised?! Teachers work from home?! PERHAPS THAT IS HOW THEY REACH THE 80 HOUR THRESHHOLD WITHOUT WORKING THROUGH THE ENTIRE NIGHT!
You should probably take care of that written agresiveness. There are other ways of dissenting than spraying capslock all over, as I am sure that you teach your 250 kids.
DeleteYes, I would think that an educator would be able to express a point without resorting to cursing and excessive use of caps lock. But maybe I'm wrong about that too. I will respond without anger:
DeleteMy post was not aimed at teachers so much as saying that people who say that simply don't realize how many hours 80 hours a week really is. It is very hard to reach those many hours without working overnight (which unless teaching has really changed, teachers don't do) or essentially spending every free hour of time working (which some lawyers or i-bankers do). Most teachers I know are parents and would not be teachers if it required them to never spend time with their children... which is essentially what 80 hours (no nights) requires of you.
You mocked me for asking my mother, but she was a high school teacher for many years so why is your opinion worth more than hers? And she wasn't offended by the question, and she answered honestly that she worked in school for 32 hours and maybe 50 hours total per week. Considering she is my mother, I think that I could argue that I have *some* concept of what teachers do.
I hope you're not an English teacher.
DeleteAnyway, something else to consider might be the built-in flexibility of most teachers' work day. Generally, a physician's time spent at work (especially for a hospitalist) is sequestered to the point that they generally work through their lunch. Teachers often get 2 periods off, as well as a lunch break. Yes, they take their work home with them, but it can be completed at a flexible pace--amid whatever other activities need to be done. Physicians generally don't have that option.
My father is a teacher, as are my 2 sisters. Outside his on-campus commitments, he also conducts a youth symphony, teaches a couple dozen private students, holds marching band rehearsals after school, conducts the school musical rehearsals/performances at night among many other things (these are the strictly school-related things; he also, for example, performs in a brass quintet).
I'm no stranger to the hours that teachers can accumulate, but I think it's comparing apples to oranges. Both teachers and physicians can work far more than 40 hours a week, but the number of hours and the nature of the work is so variable that it's useless to try to draw comparisons.
I'm also not sure what you were trying to accomplish by calling this Fizzy's "silly little blog." Was that an ad hominem? Nobody's forcing you to commit your scarce time to reading it. If it wasn't an jab, and you were sincere (because the cartoons are, of course, silly), then it's probably best not to mention it amidst your scathing rebuke.
Wait wait wait ...
Delete80 hours/1 week x 1 week/7 days = 11.43 (11 and a half) hours a day for 7 days.
But, I understand, 7-ish hours per day is spent in class ... so, 80 hours - 35 hours leaves 45 hours ... so
45 hours/1week x 1 week/7 days = 6.43 (6.5) hours per day for 7 days ... OUTSIDE of class.
So you are saying that you spend 7 hours in class, 6.5 hours per weekday on work outside of class, making it 13.5 hours. You likely spend 1.5 hours commuting, making it 15 hours per weekday, and probably another 2 hours getting ready in the morning (including breakfast), making it 17 hours per weekday. This leaves 7 hours per workday for sleep, and personal needs (such as eating, cleaning house, family, etc).
And that isn't even including the weekends.
Maybe if you didn't leave yourself (yes, I *am* saying you are responsible) only 7 hours per workday for sleep and other things, you'd have the physical and mental energy to not have to work 80 hours in a week.
And, Yes, I am a teacher. High School Chemistry/AP Chemistry. I also coach baseball. The only times I get anywhere close to 80 hours a week is during tournament times when I am coaching late on Thursday and Friday, and all day Saturday. I have 5 classes, 170 students total, with homework and tests and lab notebooks.
Yes, I'm calling bullshit on your "I'm a teacher! Worship me!" self-righteousness.
My mom is an elementary school teacher. She's also her school's language arts coordinator, which soaks up a lot of extra hours. I'd say she puts in at least 60 hours on any given week (easily 50 of those at school) and often it's more. But you're right, I'd have a hard time making it add up to 80. I agree with what Electra said, it's more an issue of over-working in individual cases. The point is, No One should work 80 hours a week! Unless they just want to.
ReplyDelete60 hours per week is definitely a big time commitment. There is a huge difference between 40 and 60 hours. 60 hours means you are working VERY hard. 60 hours of work in a week will leave most people quite tired and with very little free time.
DeleteStill (and this is more addressed to anon above), 60 does not equal 80. Saying that most teachers do not work 80 hours per week most weeks is not disrespect, it's just true. It doesn't mean that teachers are not valuable members of society or that no teacher ever works 80 hours in a particular week. It just means that they don't generally work 80 hours per week as a weekly requirement of the job.
Yes, this is my point, OMDG. 80 hours is a LOT.
DeleteWow Fizzy, look at you! Getting people so riled up and argumentative about blog posts over arguments you already had. I almost wish I could see you in the heat of the argument, because those must be ten degrees more extreme!
ReplyDeleteYesterday I ran across an interesting article on CNN Money that I think you'd like: the top 15 most stressful jobs that pay badly. In searching to find the link to post here I noticed that CNN Money has apparently done a column like this before, but this is the most recent.
Job #1 on the list: barista. Job #2: special education teacher's aide.
I read about halfway through the list, feeling pity for people in those jobs. I can imagine how they would be stressful, and the pay numbers that CNN had certainly seemed low.
Then I became curious. Halfway through the list I took a peek at the comments on the article. A number lamented that certain jobs hadn't made the list: EMT, infantryman, and so on. Then there was an interesting post that had (and still has, as of this post) the most up-votes. They remarked that people everywhere love to make it out like they have it worse than everyone else. It's true. I'm sure we've all seen people getting into pissing matches over who was worse off: who had to work harder, who had it tougher growing up, whose neighborhood was roughest. It's as if it establishes credibility, even though it has to be one of the silliest things to have a competition over. What's the prize for winning? Sympathy?
The comment I'm talking about then ended with claiming that the list was insulting. That's a bit aggressive in my opinion, but I can see where it's coming from. We're talking office jobs and jobs in relatively laid-back environments. Stress is relative and I don't mean to invalidate anyone, but come on - we don't have it so bad. (That goes for us in the medical profession, too. At least we don't have to worry about having roadside bombs on our daily commutes, nor do we need to worry about people storming the hospital, shooting and bombing in the process.)
I think the desire to show others our suffering is a cry for respect. Why do we need a hierarchy for who has it worst? A teacher's job is difficult, a doctor's job is difficult, and a barista's job is difficult. There are different stresses and difficulties involved but I'll tell you what, I'd rather handle physician work than deal with a room full of elementary school kids day in and day out. For our part, it'd be nice if people wouldn't casually remark about how physicians must have it so easy, making oh-so-much money (completely neglecting loans and the life-sucking time and effort that goes into school) and assuming that we're not working just because we're not in a room with them. Of course, you hear statements like that and it stokes a desire to put people in their place, showing them the suffering we have to go through.
The original argument wasn't much fun, in all honesty. The person was sort of all over the place. That's part of why I took it here.
DeleteI don't think being a physician is the hardest job, although it can be very hard and not just because of the hours. I wouldn't want to be a teacher, but not because of the hours, but because of other stresses of the job that I wouldn't want or feel that I could handle well. I think teachers do an important and difficult job, but doesn't it do them a disservice to lie and say that they work 80 hours when that's not accurate? If we want to praise teachers, we should talk about the hard things they really DO, because there's plenty.
I'm a lawyer in private practice and I don't think I've ever billed 80 hours in one week but I've certainly worked 80 hours in one week. Any lawyer that's gone to trial probably has.
ReplyDeleteI am a speech-language pathologist and am currently based in a hospital. I've worked in 6 different schools across 2 different states. There are different WAYS to work many hours. And my level of efficiency in the schools allowed me to be done early - even with a caseload of 75 students in two schools simultaneously. That means daily paperwork and billing for the school, district, state, and funding for all 75 students on top of regularly scheduled therapy. Yet other therapists with half the caseload complained about the time they spent working. Why?
ReplyDeleteAll jobs are different and important. At the same time, the kind of hours you work as a physician are different than those in education. As a hospital-based SLP I work weekends and holidays - including Christmas and New Year's this winter. I side with Fizzy on this one.
I know one teacher that might come close to pulling 80 hour work weeks. I'm not sure how early she shows up, but she's known for staying at school til 7 or 8pm on a pretty daily basis working on lesson plans, grading, or other paperwork. She's really, really dedicated though. There will always be someone who is an outlier.
ReplyDeleteI went to a high school that was focused on academic prep, and my high school teachers used the students as free labor - I mean, teaching assistants - to help with grading for their other classes.
Does she come in at 3 or 4AM every day? If not, she's not working 80 hour weeks unless she's putting in full days on weekends too.
DeleteI worked those exact hours as a school psychologist. I left that job after one year, and now I only work 50-60 hours per week in my new district. I often test kids throughout the day, then score and write the reports at nights and on the weekends.
ReplyDeleteMy husband is in the PhD portion of his MD/PhD program, and the time commitment he puts in as a researcher has truly tested our relationship. He generally goes into lab at 9am and typically doesn't come home until 4am doing experiments, attending meetings, writing papers, and helping others with their experiments. Some days, he comes in at 7am and doesn't come home until around 11pm or midnight. Those are LONG hours and he basically comes home to sleep and then repeats the same thing the next day. This schedule usually occurs 4 or 5 days of the week, and then he always goes in for at least 4 hours on Saturday and Sunday, sometimes longer. When he's not in lab during the weekends, he is answering e-mails and/or writing grants or publications at home. We averaged the number of hours he is in lab for the past couple months and it adds up to 80 hours a week. I think there are plenty of professions that work 80 hours per week, but if you are averaging 8 hours of sleep per night, then you are not working 80 hours per week. Let me just say that I can't wait until he goes back to complete his third and fourth years of medical school because this schedule is insane!
ReplyDeleteI agree... if you're not sleep-deprived due to work, then that's not 80 hours.
DeleteDefinitely true on the research end! My husband is a resident and I am a biophysics postdoc. I work twice as much as my husband, and I have no overnight call equivalent. It's not remotely uncommon for me to work 14-16 hour days, 7 days a week, without technically staying overnight. It's getting a little tiring with him rubbing in how nice his schedule is and how many weeks of vacation he gets compared to me, ha!
DeleteDon't forget oil-field workers in your list :) 80 hours was considered a normal week for us, unless we had a rig move - then we'd work 24's instead of 16's and sleep in our trucks between jumps.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I must add - all the doctors I know work far more than any of my HS instructors ever did.
It's official. In the last month there has been 1 funny post and 1 cartoon, along with an overwhelming number of Daily Whines.
ReplyDeleteWell, it's clear nobody was interested enough in this post to comment.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteIn Ontario, Canada I seriously doubt high school teachers make it to 80 hours. When there was a teacher strike earlier students were told teachers were only contractually allowed to mark in their 75 minute planning time and 40 minutes during their lunch. They can only teach 3 classes a semester. Of course, most teachers do work from home. A close friend is a high school teacher and he said he works max 60 hours a week and he is a part-time IB coordinator his wife teaches History and she usually puts in about 40-50 hours.
ReplyDeleteDeployed soldiers probably hit the 80 hour week most weeks. 12 hour days 7 days a week gets you to 72 and my husband had more like 14-16 hour days. This teacher says it would be hard to do as a teacher.
ReplyDeleteI'm on my toughest rotation currently (because I'm senior) and I'm pulling 11-12 hour days. But these days include no breaks (I made it to pee at 4pm, after going at home to be at work for 7:30), no lunch, and when I come home (at 7:30), I have to study and prepare for the day. If I were a lawyer (or teacher), I would count the study time as "work". But I'm a "learner", so it's not work. Without the evening prep, five days this week will be 60 hours (we do one in two weekends, this weekend I'm off). Next week, when I do one night and one weekday, I'll be at 82 hours.
ReplyDeleteIf you count study time (aka prep time, teacher paper grading time, lawyer court prep time, whatever), then I'm up to like 100.
What I'm saying is, counting hours is absurd. And comparing different professions is absurd. And if you start counting resident call (1 in 4 on busy services, less on relaxed services), then it surpasses Picasso territory. I have all respect in the world for (some) teachers, and (good) lawyers, and (helpful) nurses, and all the people that have two jobs to make a living and support the families. It's hard. And in America, medical staff aren't supported to nearly the same extent as in Canada, where most hospitals are teaching hospitals. Our staff here can say whatever they want, but they still pull half the hours that residents do.
I lost whatever point I was trying to make. I was basically agreeing with Fizzy's post. And venting a little bit. Sorry.