Yes, money is a vital part of the education equation. Of course physical facilities, equipment and learning resources are vital. But the pandemic reveals in stark reality that teachers remain the irreplaceable ingredient for student success.
Consider their nimbleness. “Utah teachers didn’t take weeks to figure out how to do distance learning. They only had 48 hours,” Utah State Superintendent of Public Instruction Sydnee Dickson told opinion editor Boyd Matheson on KSL Radio. Within a matter of days, classrooms around the state shifted all teaching operations online, a remarkable feat considering some 650,000 students are enrolled in the state’s K-12 public school system. Teachers comfortable with the digital landscape jumped right in. Some schools already had robust online systems in place. Others have had to acclimate quickly, but acclimate they have.
Adjustments continue to be made weekly, daily and hourly to meet the needs of students. This includes tailoring learning for advanced students, adjusting to those with special needs, aiding students without access to technology and helping those with little educational support in the home.
Dickson also noted the “new now,” rather than the “new normal,” is going to require educators to be nimble every day moving forward.
Utah educators are already anticipating the systems and organization needed for the fall, developing contingency plans for a potential spike in the virus — moving from a yellow threat level back to orange, or even red.
“We probably underestimated and underappreciated the relationship between student and teacher, student to student,” says Dickson. “One thing that we want to take with us into the new future, as we rethink schools in the fall, is that triangulated relationship among parent, teacher and student. We really want to keep that strength and relationship in place.”
Add to nimbleness resilience, patience, creativity, adaptability and perseverance, and teachers and students across Utah — no less around the world — are engaged in a curriculum not normally assessed in end-of-year testing. These new learning traits, developed in the midst of a pandemic, will be the education of a lifetime if taken to heart.
The new approach is, of course, fallible. Screens hinder the teacher who is expert in the art of physical interaction. Some instructors report simply missing the kids they’ve known for months. Access to technology is not equal across all demographics, with low-income parents being the most concerned their children will fall behind.
Circumstances beyond the screen don’t help, either. Fear, worry and stress abound in parents whose lives have been rocked by the pandemic. Looming over every household is a dark cloud of uncertainty.
Which, in aggregate, makes the educator’s job all the more praiseworthy. They sit at the forefront of their students’ needs, helping them cope with unprecedented circumstances, which may at times feel like the primary mission compared to completing this year’s coursework. It should elevate the meaning of this year’s Teacher Appreciation Week, which we honor across the next few days.
If you haven’t thanked a teacher recently, find an excuse to do so.
If you haven’t thanked a teacher recently, find an excuse to do so. They deserve every word of gratitude they can get.
Everyone has had a teacher in their lives who helped them realize their potential, develop a passion and believe in themselves. Take a moment to express what Utah parents and students already know: The commitment to teach is the power to transform.