Running can often be misconstrued as an individual sport; one person, one road, one finish line, but anyone who has ever been part of a running club knows this; running alone is hard, but running together makes all the difference
Many people give up on running not because they lack discipline or ability, but because they don’t have a community to fall back on. Without others to pace you, motivate you, and remind you why you started, it’s easy to fall behind, lose confidence, or stop altogether. In a strong running community, however, amateur runners grow into confident ones. They build stamina, learn from others, and eventually bring new runners along with them.
Teaching is no different.
In South Africa, teachers often feel isolated in the practice. A teacher stands alone in a classroom, responsible for big groups of learners, navigating curriculum pressures, administrative demands, and social challenges that extend far beyond the school gate. Many teachers describe their work as deeply meaningful, but also very lonely.
This isolation is not imagined. South African teachers work in a system marked by overcrowded classrooms, limited resources, and persistent inequality within education facilities. In some provinces, teachers support learners who are navigating hunger, trauma, poverty, abuse, and child headed-households; often without adequate psychosocial support themselves. The result? Burnout, exhaustion, and too often, teachers leaving the profession early.
But just like running, teaching doesn’t have to be done alone.
Across South Africa, we see glimpses of what becomes possible when teachers find one another in professional learning communities, in teacher-led networks, virtual networks, informal WhatsApp groups, and programmes that prioritise collaboration over competition. When teachers share strategies, reflect together, and hold space for one another, something shifts. Confidence grows. Practice improves. Teachers stay. And this is what Teachers CAN emphasises and encourages – a generative community for change agent teachers.
One thing teachers in our network remind us of again and again is this: teaching is better when done together. Because when we move together, we go further. Teachers possess, within them, the capacity to effect so much change, but are often left feeling brunt out because they are not held by a community that can motivate them. Ultimately, the manner in which we are most likely to overhaul the climate of education in our country is to foster a deep-rooted spirit of connectedness and community within the education ecosystem. Establishing this connectedness cannot be left to teachers alone, as there are multitudes of role-players in this very ecosystem.
Teachers, together with parents, police officers, social workers, nurses, business-owners, church leaders, etc. form part of the community which aids in ensuring we are raising well-versed and well-informed future members of society and ultimately, it is only when we work together, without pretences, that we are also ensuring our teachers are healthy and capable of completing their jobs safely and with self-assurance.
This way of being is deeply rooted in Botho, or Ubuntu; the understanding that I am because we are. Ubuntu reminds us that individual success is inseparable from collective wellbeing. In teaching, this means recognising that one teacher’s strength is multiplied when it is shared; that support, not isolation, sustains the profession.
As South Africa returns to school this week, we are stepping into a long, tough, and exciting run of a new academic year filled with possibilities, pressure, and unknown terrains. There will be moments of stumbling. There will be steep inclines and unexpected turns. There will be days when the pace feels impossible.
But no teacher is running this race alone.
There is a community behind you, beside you, and ahead of you, teachers who understand the road because they are on it too. There is space to fall, to rest, to be carried, and to rise again. This year, may we choose community over isolation, collaboration over silence, and botho over burnout.
Because teaching, like running, is not about who finishes first, it’s about how far we can go together.
By Tshepiso Motloung and Tremayne Aiken