Tuesday, May 5, 2009

Thanking Teachers

Responses to the "My Two Cents" blog often throw teachers under the bus for the financial problems schools have across Wisconsin. But today, I am going to praise teachers for the difference they have made in my life. This is National Teacher Day after all.

It all started with Sister Clara in first grade at St Mary's school in Clarks Mills. She encouraged me to read to the class and to take on extra credit work doing third and fourth grade level math. She made it okay to be the smartest kid in the class-and didn't require me to work at the pace of the others.

I also remember Mr. Kavanaugh at St Mary's--who fostered my first interest in politics during the 1984 Presidential election--and who played a great weekly Current Events contest that got me watching the nightly news and paying attention to the news on the radio in the morning.

I can't forget Mrs Alexander at St John the Baptist School in Howard who was allowed to teach the Big Bang Theory and Evolution at a Catholic school--opening my mind to the real scientific source of our universe and our species--and rescuing me from the confines of religious teachings.

And finally, my thanks to Mr Schadewald at Bay Port High School for furthering my interest in politics--especially those on the local level--and for organizing our trip to Europe--which gave me great perspective on how great it is to live in the US.

I'm sure that all of us who took our education seriously have a teacher who made a difference in our lives--and who we would never consider to be "overpaid", "lazy" or "greedy". Why not think about them today and give them a silent "thank you" for their efforts.

7 comments:

  1. Teachers are as a whole certainly worthy of our praise and admiration.

    Unfortunately, many of them are getting clobbered because they belong to a labor union who has it's hand deep in the taxpayers pocket.

    This same union, even in our current horrible economic climate, has no concern other than more more more...thereby hurting many of the families their teacher membership attempts to help each day.

    I had many excellent teachers throughout my school years, I remember the good ones fondly.

    These same high quality excellent teachers who help groom our children need to stand up to their unions and provide an educational experience to the labor union who is driving a wedge between our wonderful educators and those who provide their compensation.

    Just as teachers have a finite amount of teaching resources, taxpayers have a finite amount of money to fund additional taxes.

    Enjoy the day teachers of Oshkosh!

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  2. 8:25 is actually spot on. The first poster turns everything that's written into a pulpit for his sermonettes. But guess what? The rant has been going on for a few years now and he's accomplished nothing. A smart person would either take his rants to those that can make a difference (Madison) or learn to deal with it. Since he's done neither we can presume his teachers failed him.

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  3. Sounds like you have an axe to grind 10:50. The first poster was simply congratulating some of his teachers on a great job. You seem threatened. You must not be a teacher, maybe just a union member. That would be understandable as you are crabby and demanding.

    Happy Teachers Day!! Too bad alot of you guys have to be messed up in that union garbage.

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  4. The unions are there to protect the teachers so why would they want to stand up against it? Sheesh. If copy and paster really cared about and wanted to praise those teachers he or she had, it could've been done without the anti-union rhetoric. They just don't know when to use common decency and take a short break from their preaching. Even God rested one day.

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  5. Undoubtedly there are those teachers who walk lock-step with the union ideology. Those educators who have a blind bias for union rhetoric perhaps are not those who we honor today.

    Today we honor the humble teachers, the highly valued educators who serve the children, the community and then themselves. They are the dedicated group who put service ahead of self interest...who put the child’s education ahead of worldly demands. They are the truly valued career minded staff who arrive early and leave late…not the group who beat the children out the door at dismissal.

    These highly valued educators are those who don’t need to be “protected” by a union, they perform beyond expectations and clearly earn and deserve exceptional compensation. These are the educators who look at the union as a haven for the below average…those that have chosen a career in education for the wrong reasons.

    So hooray to the teachers who really care…and to those that hide under the dark union entitlement cloak…well, enough said.

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  6. "Today we honor the humble teachers, the highly valued educators who serve the children, the community and then themselves. "

    The funny thing about this post is teachers CAN have this attitude, and go about their job this way, and still subscribe to the union ideologies. They do need to be protected, from idiots like the one who posts over and over about entitlement, greed, and so on. Nothing like that exists, except in the mind of the typical Oshkosh Conservative known as a Cobblestoner.

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  7. "who look at the union as a haven for the below average…"

    Well said!...and more than that...accurate!

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