Going Confidently into Retirement (as published in American Choral Directors Magazine August 2024)

Retirement and the professional Choral Director

Going Confidently into Retirement 

By Dale Duncan 

I recently conducted the 2024 Colorado Middle All-State Chorus. During the first day of rehearsals, there were so many incredibly magical musical moments that I had goosebumps more times than I could count. It was the third time I had the opportunity to conduct an all-state choir. The kids came ready, and it was pure joy to work with them. I chose repertoire I had never conducted before, and it was definitely a professional stretch for me (about which I had some anxiety), but the concert was amazing. I would have never been in that moment if it weren’t for my choice several years ago to retire from thirty years of teaching. It was not an easy decision, but it was the right one for me. I hope my story helps some teachers who might be struggling with the decision to retire. There is a whole joyous, fulfilling  life on the other side that can still involve music! 

In December 2021, I read an email that the superintendent of our district sent to all employees about the next school year. As I read the email, I had a feeling of dread in the pit of my stomach. I knew that I was done with my public school teaching career, and that it was time for me to go, but I hadn’t processed it yet. I  hadn’t planned to stop teaching this early, but I knew  in my gut that I could not continue for my own well being. I could not face another winter, digging in deep and motivating my students to sing the way I had done five days a week for thirty years. If I stayed, I would be faking it, and my returns would diminish. My students  

would see. I also knew that if I made this difficult decision to retire, that I could actually joyfully teach one final semester. 

I didn’t tell anyone for five days as I tried to process my decision. I wanted to dig within my soul and make sure it was the right decision for me. I asked myself a lot of questions… How would I feel not being a part of the community at Henderson Middle School that I had been a part of for twenty years? I also live in the community, so I knew I’d be still a part of the community but not “Mr. Duncan the chorus teacher” anymore. 

How would I feel not being Mr. Duncan the public school teacher after thirty years? Was I giving up? Then, I started thinking about the logistics and mechanics of how the rest of the year would play out.  How would I want my last semester of teaching to look if I made this decision? I thought about how I was going to restructure my concert plans for the rest of the year. Did I want to do another adjudication? Was it possible that I might get to do one last live Broadway musical review? At this point, that still was not clear, since we hadn’t been allowed to have a “live” audience since  December 2019. I also had some logistics and financial pieces to put together to purchase a final year to get full benefits in the state of Georgia. 

After the fifth day of keeping it to myself and thinking it all through, I sat down with my husband and  spilled my heart out. I came up with ten questions that he had to answer about me, my patterns, my

work history…all of it. By question four, he said, “You’re retiring in May.” After thirty years together, my spouse knew me well, and he knew that I could no longer do my job for my own mental well-being. I am so grateful that he was so supportive. It was a really hard pivot for us both, but we knew that my mental health had really struggled during the pandemic, as it did for so many of  

us. I had been so fully committed to every twist and turn of online teaching, and then hybrid teaching… It was changing all the time, because first and foremost, I knew I had to do my best for the children—and it took its toll.  

So, I proceeded with getting the financial things settled to purchase the final year I needed to have full retirement, and I moved toward (joyfully) planning our  final musical revue in hopes that we would be able to have a “live” audience. I loved every minute of the process of preparing the show. It would be the first and the last for all of the students I taught, since the eighth graders hadn’t gotten to do a show as sixth graders during the pandemic. 

When the kids came back in January 2022, I told  them we weren’t doing adjudication and that we were  just going to focus on the show. I didn’t want to tell anybody I was retiring until I absolutely had to because  I wanted my students, the faculty, and the community to be invested in the performance. However, I did not want the kids to hear about my retirement from anyone but me, so in mid-March I told them right after we did our first full run-through of the musical revue. It was the perfect time because they had already committed so fully and were doing so well, and they recommitted even more fully to the rest of the process and did an amazing job on all of the performances we did in May.  The best part was that I so thoroughly enjoyed every bit of that ending. We did get to do our “live” show with an audience, and it was a wonderful way to cap off my career.  

I packed up the chorus room secretly during March/ April in a way the students couldn’t sense, out of respect for their own feelings of loss. I left everything they could see in tact until after the last child walked out of my room on the final day of school. Within two hours, everything that remained in my room was out the door and in my car. I loved my time there, but I was ready to move on. 

About a year before I ended up retiring, I had agreed to do Missouri All-State Choir in the summer of 2022 and also to go to Kansas to teach some workshops.  Having those two things on the calendar gave me some focus in those first weeks of my first summer as a retired  teacher. Because I had made this retirement decision so quickly just six months prior, I really had been on “go” so hard to get it all done that I had not taken quiet time of any sort. And when I left my classroom in May I felt excited but also sort of numb. It all felt so surreal, and I was a bit lost. That summer I had some vocal  issues that were very strange. I think it was definitely connected to my mindset. I hadn’t found what was next and literally, in some ways, lost my voice temporarily.  

I always knew that retirement for me would not be really retirement, but I wasn’t 100% sure what it would look like. I took the next several months and just listened to my thoughts. One thing I was certain about was that I did not want a five-day-a-week structured situation. I didn’t want to have to go to a building. Many years ago, I thought I would probably teach private school for a  while after finishing my public school career, but that didn’t feel right. The thought of running a program and having to go to a building every day wasn’t it for me at this juncture in my life. 

In August 2022 I started playing pickleball. Literally every morning… If it rained or was too hot or too cold, I played indoors. I became obsessed. In the afternoons, I would work on stuff for my business: Music in the  Middle with Mr. D. I was getting more invitations to do conducting gigs and workshops out of state. I found online teaching on a platform called Outschool that  would allow me to do what I want when I wanted from where I wanted. I spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to run that. I networked on the platform so I could learn more, and now I teach sight singing, private audi -tion lessons, Broadway classes, and LGBTQ+-focused  classes very part-time there. 

In February 2023, I presented some workshops at the Colorado Music Educator’s Conference. While there, I was invited to do the 2024 All-State Choir. In April 2023, the head pickleball coach where I played asked me if I’d like to be a coach. I went and got certified, and I started coaching in June 2023. It’s all very part-time… flexible. I’ve been teaching pickleball to a lot of my former parents, because where I am coaching is also in the community where I taught. A lot of my former students play tennis there. It just all felt and feels so perfectly joyful. 

I do not have any regrets about retiring. I’ve had a moment or two where I saw an awesome middle school choir teacher do incredible work and have this amazing bond with their students and I think… I used to have that. The decision to retire was difficult and something I did not take lightly, but I am grateful for where I am  now. 

Before I retired, I made a list of all of the things that had gotten on my nerves from administrative issues to building issues to difficult faculty members who don’t  like to share our lovely gym space for performances…  The list was quite long. I sent it to a very good friend,  and I said to her, in about six months when I start to romanticize this whole teaching career experience, can you please just send this right back to me? 

I loved my career. But it was definitely time. I’m  happy to say that even though I’ve officially retired  from the traditional five-day school setting, I’m not really retired… I’ve just moved to the next chapter. I’m still making income. Still saving and investing. People so often worry if they’ll have enough money, and that keeps them chained to a job that they no longer feel joy in, and that isn’t good for anyone. There’s a balance  that we must strike because tomorrow isn’t promised. 

Sometimes we have to make really bold decisions so that we can live joyfully. Sometimes we have to face a  lot of fears. But when we move toward our passions,  joys, and desires for how we want to live and where, how, and with whom we want to spend our time, we can create the vision for the next chapter and bring it  to fruition. Our most valuable asset is time. It can’t be  purchased. When we are gripped and paralyzed by fear of taking a bold step, we usually aren’t living happily. And it’s hard to teach children when you’re not living the life that you really want to live. 

Maybe some of you are thinking of changing careers. Maybe you’re close enough to retirement that  you could pull it off and create a new life. You know in your gut. If I hadn’t made the decision I did, I wouldn’t  have been in Colorado conducting amazingly prepared singers…playing pickleball in the mid-day…spending  more time with loved ones…having the flexibility that  

I’d never had before…creating new materials for teachers…teaching online…and on and on. My life as a music teacher looks different than it used to look, and I love every single day of it. 

During my first year of teaching back in 1989, I put a poster on the front of my piano so the students could see it every single day. It’s a Henry David Thoreau quote: Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you’ve imagined. 

I was doing it then. And I’m doing it now. And I  hope that I keep doing that for all the years I’ve got left on this planet. 

Dale Duncan is the creator of the S-Cubed Sight  Singing Program for Beginners. He taught middle  school music in public schools for thirty years before re tiring in 2022. He is a Grammy Music Educator Award  semi-finalist and all-state choir conductor. 

CHORAL JOURNAL August 2024 Volume 65 Number 1 59