Steve Frey
You may have missed a recent news story about a slight toward teachers. You can bet most teachers in Southwest Virginia didn’t, but we’ll get to that in a moment.
Teachers have a huge responsibility. Students and parents often focus on passing or failing grades; teachers carry the burden every day of preparing students to succeed for the rest of their lives.
It’s a heavy load. A teacher has about 180 days to cover the academic material in the curriculum. The thing is, though, life is more complicated than just presenting goals and objectives and measuring student progress. If you are a teacher, you know that. If you are a parent, you should know that, too.
Many students come to school with much more than the weight of backpacks on their shoulders. Some carry the burden of hunger; they didn’t have dinner the night before because there wasn’t any food. Others carry the weight of abuse by a parent who had a troubled life when they were young. Some shared a bed with a sibling who wasn’t feeling well, so they didn’t sleep. Some have only one parent in the home and had to feed and put their brothers and sisters to bed themselves. Teachers help children carry those added weights.
Some students have learning difficulties, attention struggles or emotional challenges. Teachers create plans and interventions to help them to be successful, too. They never give up on them.
Usually, parents are supportive. However, sometimes parents blame the teacher for the child’s difficulties. Teachers work through those issues, too.
They also carry on through fire drills, lockdowns, weather emergencies and other disruptions to lessons.
They push through it all. Teachers constantly plan and assess student work at night and on weekends, and they seldom get a good night’s sleep on those 180 or so school nights. Many work a second job to make ends meet.
That’s why Donald Trump, Jr.’s comments at a recent rally were so hurtful. Here’s the quote: “I love seeing some young conservatives because I know it’s not easy. Keep up that fight. Bring it to your schools. You don’t have to be indoctrinated by these loser teachers that are trying to sell you on socialism from birth. You don’t have to do it. Because you can think for yourselves. They can’t.”
“Loser teachers.” The words hit many teachers almost as hard as anything they face daily. Teachers don’t focus on parents, students or anyone being conservative or liberal. They are too busy. They’re not indoctrinating students to be socialists from birth or anything else but thoughtful Americans.
Hmmm, this is the budget season in Southwest Virginia and around the country. Are teachers socialists because they want fair pay and benefits? Are they socialists because in some states they went on strike after being forced to go without a raise for ten years and use decades-old textbooks? Is this a little shade on teachers for speaking out? Or is this somehow related to the students from the Parkland carnage who have spoken out over the last year and sparked a national discussion and other similar exchanges?
Teachers do model and teach the Golden Rule. They do focus on character traits like honesty, compassion, courage, forgiveness, perseverance, tolerance, responsibility and many others. They teach children to think critically and use their knowledge and sense of right and wrong to make decisions.
Teachers also understand that children come from many different family religions and political backgrounds and respect that in words and actions.
Oh, Trump, Jr. is just mouthing a talking point to excite the crowd, of course. Unfortunately, the audience clapped and cheered, placing teachers in the same “basket of deplorables” as journalists, politicians who don’t agree with the president, allied leaders who disagree with administration policy and many others. It is sad to see our hardworking educators used as political chess pieces like this.
Fortunately, the majority of Americans know this concept of indoctrination is nonsense and appreciate teachers for the hardworking professionals they are.
Teachers are not “losers.” They are the backbone of America and are educating children on the front lines in schools that often don’t have the resources they need. They also face difficulties only they are trained to handle and are often receiving a salary that is not nearly compatible with their responsibilities.
These professionals Trump, Jr. calls “losers” perform miracles every day. They prepare children for a 21st-century future and to be knowledgeable, compassionate citizens. We witness this daily in Southwest Virginia.
Teachers deserve better than to be a punch line in a campaign speech. They merit, at the very least, our respect as well as fairness in wages, responsibilities and resources.
Most of all, though, they deserve our thanks—and not derision.
Steve Frey is a writer and CEO of Ascendant Educational Services based in Radford.
