For them, each day is a battle for respect.

They are the ones who are hired for one day, maybe two, maybe a week or a month at a time.

They are the temporary teachers, the substitutes, the ones who step in to fill the space left while the full-time instructors are away.

He is the sixty-year-old, standing on his tiptoes, scrawling his name higher than he can actually reach on the whiteboard when you walk into third period. Or maybe she is middle-aged, readjusting her glasses on the bridge of her nose, as she flips through an encyclopedia-sized lesson plan during passing period.

To the average student, only one thing matters: this is not your teacher.

We all know how it feels to walk into a classroom, fully prepared for yet another fifty-five minutes of work, and to be hit with the surprise of a substitute teacher. We know the relief at the prospect of an hour off, of socializing with our friends or watching a movie or even just relaxing.

After all, who is this substitute, this stranger, to assume authority over you and your classmates?

Mr. Regnier — pronounced reh-nay — is a familiar face around Garfield. You might recognize him by the blue suspenders he sometimes wears that stretch across the plaid pattern of his shirt, or by his large black-rimmed glasses, as he stands behind the desk in one of the history classrooms in the building. The school has been hiring him regularly as a substitute since 2000; usually, he works a few long-term jobs during the year — typically lasting approximately several weeks — and spends the rest of the time working in shifts that range from one day to about a week in length at the various schools in the Seattle district.

The biggest obstacle he faces in his career is dealing with students who refuse to acknowledge that he is truly there to teach, and not to waste time. “Students will always try to take advantage of their substitute teacher,” Mr. Regnier explained. “but just because there is a different person up at the front doesn’t mean there is any difference in the learning.”

Ms. Walton, who has been filling in for Mr. Miranda’s language arts and journalism classes for several weeks, agreed. “Sometimes people treat me badly because I’m a substitute teacher … and that’s just bad living,” she stated. The worst times are when she gets cussed out by disrespectful students; once, during such an experience, she felt that her physical safety was threatened.

When the classes refuse to respect you or even listen to you, every period can be a struggle. Students expect that the presence of a substitute means a guaranteed free day, Mr. Regnier said; however, they should always be expecting to learn something, whether or not their regular teacher is there.

The positive changes are what keep him coming to work each day, all over the city. “The best part is getting to go to the different schools, the different districts, the different classes and students, and seeing the differences between classes,” he said. “I especially enjoy seeing progress in the schools. I’ve been to schools where five years ago there was a huge achievement gap and no discipline; and recently when I have been back to these schools I have seen so many changes for the better.”

Besides taking joy in the growth of students and schools, there are a few other perks to the job. Unfortunately, health insurance isn’t one of them. But a lot of free time is; after all, subbing is a lot like attending school, only without the homework, tests, or classwork.

“After sixth period I can just go home, kick back, and watch the soaps I recorded,” Ms. Walton explained. “There’s no grading or planning involved.”

Unfortunately, these benefits can’t always outweigh the pressures and stresses of substitute teaching. Whether it is a result of kids mocking a sub’s accent or characteristics, we have all had one who has cracked under the pressure. But will the tears of one sub stop students from degrading the next one?

Marianne Sitcov, who began her teaching career earlier this year as a substitute in the Seattle and Highline school districts, believes that the reason for the distant and often hostile relationship between students and subs stems from the lack of connection between the two. “The hardest part is that you don’t really get a chance to know the kids because you’re in there just for the day and it sometimes feels like you’re just the monitor,” she said. “You’re just dropping in, and they see you as an outsider. You can’t really build respect or a connection in one day.”

She also struggles with the difficulty of balancing this kind of rote supervision with her desire to thoroughly teach subjects. “You don’t really get to teach,” she said. “You’re just watching over them while they watch a movie or do a worksheet, whatever their teacher specified in the lesson plan.”

Like Mr. Regnier, Ms. Sitcov enjoys being able to work in a wide range of settings, which is helpful while she considers where to take a job next year in a permanent teaching position. “The best part is that you get to see different schools, and it’s kind of fun to get to see how different schools work.”

And that is the life of a substitute; going from classroom to classroom, school to school. Every period seeing thirty new faces, and thirty more the next hour, and thirty more the hour after that. Every day working to earn the respect of a new set of students, to teach them something, and just to try to do their job as best they can.