By Kristin
I admit, when my friend read this to me there was a moment – about when he read "Being an educator means that you are a part of the noblest profession … Quite frankly it takes a special person to be an educator," – that I started thinking of the bills I've paid this month and the bills I have yet to pay. Teachers are either noble or destroying children, it seems, and I think reality is that we're all in a middle ground. Am I noble if I'm tired of looking at essays instead of my daughters? I don't think so. Am I destroying children if I often put the grading down and read Go Dog, Go? I don't think so.
But by the end, I admit it, I was inspired. I love when I'm proven wrong. This high school principal's essay got me where it counts when he wrote, "The educator that I just described … will … never fall victim to the bitterness." "Ouch!" I thought. I don't want to be that teacher!
By the time I heard, "Educators, those who are in the trenches working tirelessly to help all children learn, should be in the driver's seat when it comes to reform." I was nodding my head and thinking, not of my bills, but, "Yeah. We should."
Unfortunately, "reform" has become a loaded word. Where I live, in Seattle, it's a term like "Palestinian," "Jewish Settlement," "Abortion," or "Decaf" that can shut a conversation down instantly. I tried to talk to a woman about a gorgeous book, The Lemon Tree, and she said, "I just don't talk to people about Israel." So much for conversation and understanding. I had a beloved colleague – a man who was my personal hero in the education field – tell me we couldn't talk about education, that we "thought too differently." So much for celebrating differences.
How far will we get if everyone who thinks the same thing stays in one group, agreeing with each other, and everyone in a different group just stays over there, agreeing with each other? Do we need to play Red Rover? The union can cry, "Red Rover, Red Rover, send Geoffrey Canada over!" The reform groups can cry, "send a teacher with 30 years experience over!" Do we need our own educational Camp David Accords?
I'd love to see teachers not simply take the driver's seat when it comes to reform, I'd like to see teachers talk about it. I'd like to see open conversations about reform issues that aren't immediately shouted down, shut down, or so filled with generalizations and misinformation that the conversation becomes a futile exercise in clarifying the issues, in getting the facts straight.
I'm grateful to Principal Sheninger for complimenting passionate teachers, encouraging them and expecting them to take the drivers seat. Right now I just wish teachers with differing opinions would get into the car together and before anyone takes the wheel or turns the ignition, I wish they'd turn to each other with open minds and talk.
It’s one thing to be passionate. It’s another thing to be convinced that you’re right.
I love talking to people who are passionate about education and teaching. I hate talking to people who think they know everything about education and teaching.
Sometimes I wish we’d all stop with the “overarching issues” and just focus on the task of teaching; the mundane things that good teachers do in front of their students.
If we all did those things well, it would go a long way toward solving most of the problems that “reformists” and “unionist” argue about.
Travis, yes…Hyperbole. I feel like teachers are either deified or vilified, and really we’re neither. Sometimes we do amazing work, but I know the same year and period I changed a child’s life – in a good way – I was the teacher another child couldn’t stand to be with.
It is hard to be a partner, parent and healthy adult and also do what some expect teachers to do. It’s hard.
Education, like childhood, isn’t something that is easily captured with broad brush strokes.
Mark, I hadn’t even thought of the reality that passion often equals someone who’s less-willing to compromise, but your point is well made. I think you’re right.
Well placed passion goes a long way.
What struck me is the idea that a teacher could destroy children. Hopefully, that was hyperbole, and a reference to a teacher putting his life before the students. And in many cases, such as myself, or lives of my family before my students. On occasion. To keep things in balance.
It would, as you clearly infer, to sacrifice family every time.
I have found this a hard balance over my 15 years of teaching. I feel at a good place now and have created a system to honor kids and my kids. However, because I have a certain personality, I became a teacher, and because I am a teacher, I still feel a bit when the 156 essays are left at school.
I think passion can lead to great conversation, but two opposing sides, each passionate, might speak articulately and listen carefully, but if there are any minds that are hard to change it is those of the passionate.
I agree that conversation must be the first step, but also that passionate people on both sides must be willing to set down some of their views and allow room for the others’. The open minds you mention in your last line is what I think some people see as incongruous with passion. If you are passionate, you stay the course, hold firm, don’t back down. We need both sides to recognize that compromise and cooperation is not backing down–it is not the compromising of values and beliefs when middle ground is agreed upon.