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Being a Teacher

Such tragedy - the story of every teacher this Time magazine article covers. I have been fortunate to see some of the most amazing people teach J, root for her success and love her. My kid owes much of who she is today to those that taught her. There was brilliance, kindness, humor and compassion in those teachers - some of whom have completely transformed lives of kids they came into contact with, including J's. 

Teaching has long been dominated by women, and experts say the roots of its relatively low pay lie in sexism. “The ‘hidden subsidy of public education’ is the fact that teachers for many years were necessarily working at suppressed wage levels because they really had no options other than teaching,” says Susan Moore Johnson, a professor of education at Harvard and an expert in teacher policy.

It may also be true that the best most tenacious teachers love their job so much that they are willing to bear a great deal of hardship to keep teaching kids. In a sense we are all beneficiaries of such unconditional love for the job and their desire to help our kids. In every profession there are those that are very dedicated to the trade and will overlook hardships for their love of doing what they do. 

My friend T, the mother of two teen kids works brutal 70-80 hour weeks with a lot of international travel. She gets paid well but not nearly enough to warrant the sacrifices she has been making for years. Yet, T will have it no other way. You could not make her sit at an undemanding desk bound job for equal or even better pay. 

There are those who are beneficiaries of T's "irrational exuberance" about her job much like some of long-suffering school teachers who make enormous personal sacrifices to teach children. Yet, beyond this minority population there are the vast number of folks who love what they do well enough not "irrationally" so. When it comes to our teachers, failing them is failing our kids.

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