“This was taken at Yosemite a few years ago. I was there for a field trip, and I remember thinking ‘I really like this place. I want to come back.’ It’s one of the places I was planning to visit this summer.”

Cristopher Bautista on the longest day ever

After nearly six years with Oakland Unified School District, Cristopher Bautista had found his rhythm teaching English and History to middle and early high school students. Then Covid hit, and what was already a stressful job — teachers truly are heroes — became a twilight zone of logistical and emotional challenges. Cris spoke with me from his apartment in Fremont, CA, where he has lived since 2017. His parents live nearby, which is nice, he said. And he has his own space — which is also nice. Below, Cris shares how he’s been navigating teaching over Zoom, what he’s noticed about how students are adapting, and how being a teacher is now more expensive than ever.

I can’t even imagine what 2020 has been like for you.

The last day we were in physical school was March 13th, which was also a Friday the 13th. I feel like time has stopped since then. In my mind, the current sophomores are still my freshmen because I never got the closure of wrapping up the school year with them. We did distance learning, but it wasn’t the same.

Let’s talk about distance learning. Tell me more about your experience as a teacher.

Even though I’ve been teaching for over six years, I feel like a new teacher given the circumstances. I had never taught over Zoom before.

In March, when we had to finish up the school year remotely, it was pretty much all asynchronous work, meaning I never actually met with all my students at the same time. When we went back to school in August, I wasn’t doing face-to-face time because kids were under different circumstances — some of them had to get jobs, some of them had to take care of their siblings. So the fall was weird because we were still transitioning. And I teach freshmen, who are starting at a new school with new classes, and they don’t know anyone. It was really awkward.

“Even though I’ve been teaching for over six years, I feel like a new teacher given the circumstances.”

And there are a lot of equity issues. Like, there were kids who couldn’t get online for the first two weeks of distance learning because they didn’t have internet or a computer. So they quickly got behind for reasons outside of their control. I’m a teacher who cares about making the playing field even for all children in my classroom, and I felt like I wasn’t doing that. But it wasn’t my fault. I need to remind myself it’s not my fault — it’s the fault of systemic oppression that’s been happening in the education system for decades.

“This is Waffle, one of my two cats. He’s 7 years old. I feel like dogs are great with their humans working from home all the time now. They’re like, ‘Cool. I like being with my human.’ But with cats, at first they were like, ‘Cool, I got my human here, I’ma hang out with them.’ And then eventually it was just like, ‘Hey, leave me alone. I got things to do.’ ’Cause during lunch I’ll be like, ‘Hey, I wanna pet you.’ And the cats will be like, ‘No.’”

How else has teaching changed for you since schools moved to distance learning?

For me, teaching has become a constant question of whether to have my kids get to know each other, or develop the skills they’ll need for sophomore year. Sometimes I feel like I’m failing the kids by choosing to focus on the learning. It’s been a struggle. I’ve become really burnt out—not just teaching, but also worrying about what I’m doing wrong. And the lag time between kids showing me they understand stuff is so much slower than before.

In person, I was able to tell if a kid understood something by the look on their face. Because freshmen — they can’t hide their emotions. If they’re confused, they will look confused, even if they say they get it. So if everyone in the room looked confused, I knew I needed to reteach a thing. But with distance learning, I don’t have that. When I teach, most kids’ cameras are off. I feel like I’m talking to myself a lot.

When we go back…if we go back…these kids are gonna come in and be like, “Mr. Bautista! What’s up?” And I’ll be like, “Who the hell are you?” But I know their personalities, I’ve seen their writing, I’ve interacted with them on some level, either through text or email. It’s just so weird how I can’t link the personality to the face because I haven’t seen the face.

What have you noticed about how students are adjusting?

It is really cool to see students advocate for themselves more. I’ve told them that with distance learning, they need to speak up for themselves. If they don’t turn in an assignment, I don’t know if it’s because something family-related happened, if they’re confused, or if they just don’t want to do it — they need to let me know. And kids are actually speaking up, whereas freshmen are usually too shy to ask for help. I hope that self-advocacy carries over into their next years.

“Back in May, I went apricot-picking with my aunt on her old coworker’s property in Los Altos. It was my first time really getting out since quarantine started. It was wild to be outside my apartment. My mom made my mask.”

What are some of your personal plans that the pandemic turned upside down?

For the last few years, I’ve had a second job working at Starbucks. But I quit that in September of 2019 with the intention of using summer 2020 — my first free summer — to travel and have fun. I remember in February of this year I was beginning to think about my plans ’cause spring break was coming up and spring break is like a taste of summer break. But I never got to that planning stage.

At first I thought I would give it a month, and that we’d be fine by May, maybe. But once I knew the school year would start remotely, I spent the summer studying up on how to do distance learning. Part of me is glad I did that because I was a lot more prepared than other teachers when we came back this fall. But I also feel like I never really had a break. I feel like it’s just been one really long day since March 13th.

What or who has helped you through some of the hardest moments since March 13th?

Talking with other teachers has been really important, because we’re all just making things up as we go. I’ve become more social with the other teachers because I can be honest when I feel depressed or burned out—we’re a lot more vulnerable with each other, which is nice. Because sometimes teaching is this weird competition where teachers only highlight all the great things they’re doing and present themselves as though they totally have it all together. But I’m just like, “I have no idea what I’m doing. I’m one week behind grading. I’ve got 10 emails in my inbox from kids who have no clue what’s going on.” Having other teachers reframe it for me is nice. Also, no one knows the teacher struggle as well as other teachers. It’s been a good reminder to be kinder to myself.

What’s a reframe that’s been particularly helpful?

Teaching is all about adaptation. Every year we teach the same content, but we have different kids and we have to adapt to the energy of those kids, and adapt to what they understand, and what they know, and who they are. Back in March — as it was dawning on us that the pandemic wasn’t going anywhere — some teachers quit, and some teachers retired because they couldn’t put up with this, which is understandable. It’s a stressful profession. At first I was afraid that the last five years of perfecting my craft and learning what it means to be a good teacher were out the window. But eventually I realized this is just another form of adaptation. We’re adapting to different teaching styles, we’re adapting to different students — it’s the same sort of energy that’s made teaching exciting every year.

“Eventually I realized this is just another form of adaptation. We’re adapting to different teaching styles, we’re adapting to different students — it’s the same sort of energy that’s made teaching exciting every year.”

That’s why I like being a teacher. I teach the same thing, but it feels different every year. It never gets boring. This is kind of a version of that, and reframing it that way makes things a lot more manageable to think about. Kids are working, and turning things in, and learning. I compared the kids’ work to my freshmen at this time last year, and the quality of work is about the same. So it’s pretty cool how, despite the difficulties, we’ve all been able to adapt. It’s not just me — it’s the kids too.

“Over the summer I got tired of ordering takeout, so I decided to learn how to cook this spicy Filipino coconut pork stew. I had to sautée these really spicy, tiny peppers — which started to make everyone’s eyes water. So I had to take the stew outside and finish cooking it on this little grill.”

What else have you realized about yourself through this time?

As a gamer, I actually have a lot of skills that are transferable to teaching remotely. For example, I built a gaming computer a couple of years ago, and I already had everything set up in terms of my keyboard and my mouse. And my layout for teaching is very much like a streamer. So kids pay attention because the setup is familiar and relatable. This is a weird time, but once I realized I have certain skills that translate to distance learning, I felt a bit better.

As a Thank You for sharing your story with me, I’ll be donating to any person or place of your choosing. You’ve chosen your Digital Classroom fund — tell me more about it.

Every year during Back to School night, I ask for donations, which is super problematic. All teachers ask for donations and usually it’s for things like Post-its, paper, dry-erase markers, hand sanitizer — all the stuff districts should be paying for but aren’t. And it turns out distance learning is expensive. I had to upgrade my internet because my roommate is also a teacher and we’re streaming lessons at the same time. I also had to upgrade my internet hardware because my hardware was five years old which was causing my video and audio to lag.

So this fund goes towards things like my internet costs and the subscriptions I purchase to give my students a richer learning experience. Because Google Slides and Google Documents only go so far, and there are other cool interactive tools for kids to use. Of course, I feel really weird about how the technology industry is taking advantage of educators. Because some districts are paying for tools — but many aren’t. And turns out it’s more expensive to be an online teacher than an in-person teacher. Districts are actually saving money because teachers are now paying for overhead. But that’s a whole other conversation about education and capitalism.

To contribute to Mr. Bautista’s Digital Classroom:

Paypal: cristopher.bautista@ousd.org (note: no “h” in “Cristopher”) or Venmo: @BautistaBarista

“A big way I’ve dealt with the trauma of quarantine is by playing Animal Crossing. And in Animal Crossing, you can build anything you want. There was one point where I realized I really missed being in a physical classroom, so I spent hours recreating a classroom in this video game space. It’s so weird how much I was missing seeing school desks. I miss writing on whiteboards. My handwriting is terrible — the kids know this — but I just miss that experience. Having those basic things in this video game has been comforting.” (All photos in this piece provided by Cristopher.)