TEACHERS USE SUMMER JOBS TO RELIEVE STRESS

Once the summer bell rings, and the schools empty themselves of the noise and activity of the school year, it is not only the students who find themselves searching for summer jobs.

Many area teachers put away lesson planners and pick up paint brushes and file away the ties and blouses and replace them with pins that say, "Thank you for shopping ..." and "My name is. ..."

But the need that pushes some teachers into the world of retail sales and manual labor through the hot days of summer is not only financial -- it is emotionally uplifting.

Sherry Ford, who is about to begin her second year of teaching eighth-grade basic reading at Cape Girardeau Junior High School, spent the summer painting many of the classrooms and hallways she will be moving through this semester. It was her first summer of painting since she began teaching 14 years ago, but not her first summer job.

"I've taught summer school for seven years," Ford said. "I've really enjoyed painting. I've enjoyed getting to know all the other people and I've learned what it takes to keep a building in good repair.

"Also, it's less stressful than dealing with students."

Stress and low pay seem to be common motivators for teachers to find summer employment. Ford said she has enjoyed painting this summer more than she has teaching summer school, even though she admits that teaching is her passion.

"Being without students all summer makes it a lot easier to go back," she said. "I'm looking forward to my second year."

Many teachers echo this sentiment.

Jo Peukert, a seventh-grade social studies teacher at Louis J. Schultz in Cape Girardeau, calls her part-time job as a wallpaper sales clerk, "my therapy job."

Peukert, who has been teaching in the Cape area for nine years and working summer jobs nearly as long, has had a variety of occupations outside of teaching. She has painted, taught summer classes and adult basic education courses. She picked up a degree in design while living in San Diego and used that since in times of need.

"I've gone into design jobs when there were no teaching jobs available," Peukert said.

She uses the summer jobs as a way of relieving stress, but that is not her only motivation.

"I'm in it for the money," Peukert said. "I'm able to afford those extra things in life, a few treats."

The extra money also helps her pay for the cost of continuing her education, something all teachers must do.

June Swift, a 10-year English teacher at Scott City High School, is a self-described people person and likes to find jobs in the summer that allow her to have fun.

Swift has been a teller at a First National Bank, as a front desk clerk at a Holiday Inn, a sales clerk at Famous-Barr and a sales person at a fireworks stand.

"(Being a bank teller) was great," she said. "It was fun to handle all that money. Teachers don't often get to handle money."

Swift said she has fun during the summers, but it's nothing like the joy she gets from teaching.

"I love what I do, and I love where I am," she said, adding that she doesn't even mind running into her students at her summer jobs. "Not at all. It's fun to see them."

The break she receives from the stress and paperwork of being a teacher allows her to appreciate the good points of teaching. So when the summer begins to wind down and the first days of classes draw near, Swift is only too happy to put down whatever occupation she has taken on for the summer and go back to work.

"I get excited every time I think of the prospect of getting back to school," she said.

Cherie Worth, a learning disorders teacher in the Cape Girardeau public school system, said her job this summer as a painter for the school system, has done more than just provide her with some extra income.

"I like the camaraderie," she said. "We get to chat while we're working. If it were just painting alone in a room, it wouldn't be worth the money."

Worth, who's type of teaching is especially stressful, gets to relax while layering a classroom wall with white enamel. Her description of a summer job away from students and paperwork pretty much says it all.

"This is no stress," she said. "This is called a form of summer therapy."