Dan Rather: Thank You Teachers
Dan Rather currently substacks (can we start using that as a verb now) at Steady. About a month ago he offered encouraging words for teachers at the end of a difficult year.
There has been so much upheaval, so much sadness, so many reasons to be dejected and deterred. And yet every day, across this vast and diverse country, women and men get up and set about on one of the most important tasks facing our nation —inspiring and educating our children. Whenever I feel myself sliding into despair I think about these millions of teachers dedicating their lives to the proposition that we can build a future better than our past.
The hardships around schooling during the pandemic have been well documented, remote learning for many, an on-the-fly imperfect experiment in pedagogy that was forced by necessity. Sadly, whether schools should be open to in-person learning, or not, has become yet another partisan political battle. And our educators have found themselves in the middle, sometimes even cast as villains for rightfully worrying about their safety. Meanwhile, the challenges of our present moment further amplify the inequities and injustices that have long plagued our school system.
There is so much to say about the larger state of education, and I hope to return to this topic often, but today I want to dedicate this space to my deep appreciation for teachers and educators more broadly.