Grace and Perspective; thank you, teachers, we really do love you

Teachers, sincerely we thank you, thank you and thank you for loving and caring for our children.

We’re currently in the third year of a pandemic with no end in sight. These are historic times, indeed. As an educator, you’re charged with one of the toughest jobs around and yet you do it so well. Every one of us remembers a teacher who recognized the superstar in us and helped encourage us. Against all odds, you’re still out here doing it every day.

In the past couple of weeks there has been an explosion of COVID-19 cases. Schools are shutting down in an effort to get ahead of the spread. You, dear educators, have been on the front lines and surrounded through all of this.

You’ve got a never-ending challenge with the children you love. You work hard to help them become all they can be. You’ve got the demands of their parents as well as our current modern culture to navigate. It seems that in our modern world parents believe their child is seldom wrong and you’ll just have to figure out a way to make things work. You take on the load of not only expectations from the law and the school board, but also those of parents who don’t have the means to do what you’re doing without you. You’ve got administrators setting unrealistic expectations and national accreditations that are more concerned with hitting the right number than they are with educating a child.

Regardless of setbacks, you’ve got a fire in you that makes you want to make the world better for everyone. You have confidence that you can carry the world on your shoulders even when you shouldn’t have to. Several of you have reached out in frustration or expressed your anger online in both direct and passive ways.

The school board meeting this week has sparked a lot of discussions, hardly any are positive. The discussion about teachers was especially difficult to watch as the efforts to reduce the number of Covid infections went deep down the authoritarian well. Leaders were openly angry and threatening towards the very people they should be working to help. Those people are you, the teachers. When the going got tough, the leaders…um, did something not quite leaderlike of them.

Please forgive them.

They’ve also got a big load to carry and their frustration is palpable. Everywhere they go now they are being met with disapproval on some level. Yes, they chose that job but they are also human. Do not, however, forget what they’ve said or the way they’ve said it.

Teachers, you deserve all the grace, love and appreciation that our community can bestow on you. You’re doing the very best you can do with a herculean battle all around you. Let us hope this pay raise from the state passes and you, at the very least, get a little more money for your pain.

School board, we urge you to cut administration’s pay by half and give it to the teachers in the form of a pay raise. Also, if you’re going to openly speak about educators, show them grace and perspective.

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