languages (Teachers)

From: sjm <sethm_at_loomcom.com>
Date: Fri Mar 10 12:38:01 2000

On Fri, Mar 10, 2000 at 08:58:43AM -0700, Richard Erlacher wrote:
> Another thing to keep in mind about these jobs is that not only is the
> summer vacation long, but there are plenty of days without kids in the
> building, when most teachers go skiing or golfing, or hot-tubbing, and the
> workday for most of them is less than 6 hours.
>
> Dick

I think it's extremely unfair to label all teachers like this.
You make them sound lazy. I know only one highschool teacher today,
but I do know he works his ass off. He does NOT take the summer off,
he takes summer teaching contracts to make ends meet. After teaching
his classes he has, further courses of his own to attend, papers to
grade, lesson plans to work out, staff meetings, conference meetings,
parent-teacher meetings, and inbetween tons of shit none of us
would want to deal with dumped on him. Sometimes he doesn't get
home until 11:00 -- and neither do I, but at least I get paid for it.

I attended public school between 1979 and 1992, in both California
and Connecticut. We moved around frequently, and I was in 8
different schools during that time. That's a lot of different school
systems, and a lot of different teachers. Yes, I had some that were
merely doing their job, not going the extra mile. And I think I
can probably put my finger on exactly one who I would honestly call
lazy (everybody has a teacher horror story to tell). But those who
stand out in my mind were the genuine heros. They were IN to what
they did. They LOVED the kids. They latched on to us and energized
us and really taught us. They made us solve problems, they made us
work together, they made us look forward to their classes every day.
They had a passion for what they did, and God bless them for it.

I can't think of a more honorable profession.

-Seth
Received on Fri Mar 10 2000 - 12:38:01 GMT