By now, you likely have already blown through your New Year’s resolution and are ready to move on to goals less lofty and more achievable… Like reading my weekly e-zine. Having not written for a couple of weeks, I have a lot to share, which is why you should set a goal of finishing this e-zine.
I recently overheard a VERY heated discussion at a restaurant that I can only assume was about immigration. I didn’t write it down, but it went something like this:
Person 1: We can get others to do the job. There are plenty of people who are looking for work and would be happy to do that job.
Person 2: These people work twelve hours a day in conditions that most of us would find unimaginable. They work from dawn till dusk, behind fenced walls, six days a week. We pay them horrible wages, treat them like second class citizens, and scorn them while we use their cheap labor to make our lives easier. They need our help, not our condemnation.
I say I can only assume they were talking about immigration, because from what I heard, I thought they were talking about education. Yep, I said EDUCATION!
To my way of thinking, education is the new immigration and teachers are the new migrant workers. Don’t believe me? Re-read the conversation above and tell me that those statements are not applicable to our profession.
Like immigration, education is a hot button issue for politicians and pundits alike. They bloviate about it because it is an easy punching bag filled with people too pre-occupied with doing good work to fight back. Critics use inflammatory rhetoric and generalities to simplify and demean a complex problem that they likely do not understand, a profession they are not experienced in, and a job they have never done! Their ideas and opinions flow much freer than the money needed to implement them.
They do this because it's easy. They do this to make themselves appear better. They do this because they are ignorant.
You do this because it's hard. You do this to make others better. You do this because you are educated.
They may have the bully pulpit, but we know how to handle school yard bullies.