The hours will make you feel insane and constantly exhausted, even though they are changing the school day hours next year the actual hours for employees will not be changing and it's hard to say whether that time you are at work when students are not will be used wisely. Class sizes are FAR too large and that coupled with the length of day and the academic schedule is a breeding ground for burnt out teachers and students. Inclusion classrooms in early childhood only have a lead teacher and an assistant, with support staff pushing in. The amount of students is also about the same size as other classrooms but with students that may have 20+ hour IEPs. The organization of your school will vary wildly depending on leaderships, but there's a lot of meetings that could've been emails, and not near enough planning time even though two days a week you are there until 5:00! Prepare to be micromanaged, observations from leadership happen at least once a week but often times more and this results in very small, not always useful feedback. This kind of hands on coaching is helpful for a new teacher but not one that has been teaching for 3+ years. Can easily turn into a toxic work environment - often school leadership will pit teachers against each other which leads to cliques and gossip. The teacher shortage is hitting KIPP just like the rest of country, but even on days when a school is out 3 or more teachers admin is not stepping in to teach, set up classrooms, etc which does not help the low moral. There's very little autonomy for teachers when it comes to planning - lots of pre-written lesson plans. All of these reasons are why I am leaving and why lots of other teachers are leaving as well.
