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A long-time percolating idea, several years, essentially, this is a salute to teachers.  To me, it is a must to write it, especially after one of the worse years ever in the classroom, due to extremely poor administrative leadership and unbelievably out of control “students,” though small in number.

The cup of human history runneth over with nameless, unsung heroes.  One of the largest groups among them is that of the dedicated classroom teacher.  Such a person ranks not simply as a teacher but as an artist.  For contrary to popular belief, strong, unadulterated teaching is truly an art, and those who do it well are truly artists—albeit “starving artists.”

In short, dedicated classroom teachers typically are overworked and underpaid.  They are underappreciated and over-criticized.   They are verbally and physically victimized and, all too often, ostracized.  Yet, they and their profession greatly help to shape the world.  For if there is at least one person that all people, both past and present, will have contact with at least once in their lives, it mostly likely will be a teacher.  And, hopefully, it will be a truly dedicated one.

Sadly, undedicated teachers do exist and “rule” and “reign” over and influence young minds.  But undedicated lawyers and doctors, dentists and nurses, police officers and plumbers, and any and all other so-called professional and non-professional jobholders, from the “highest” to the “lowest” levels, exist, too.  That even includes parents and preachers.

The point is, all too many people, whether they are familiar with his words or not, seem to echo, if not live out, the most unwise words of the great playwright George Bernard Shaw, as found in his play, Man and Superman: “Those who can, do, and those who can’t, teach.”  I wonder who taught Shaw how to write?  In other words, teachers, most especially in America, seem to have been placed not on the longer end of the totem pole but squished entirely beneath it.

The verbal, physical, and psychological assaults that teachers endure yearly are astounding.  The assaults come not only from students but also parents, who claim to be truly interested in their “child” but only near the end of the school year when it is obviously apparent that, due to that “child’s” long-time refusal to complete virtually any of his/her work, they will fail.  Assaults also come from within “the house of learning,” co-workers, who allow their own insecurities to get the best of them and dig pitfalls for the objects of their insecurities and jealousy, planting the seeds of division and deceit.

In all honesty, it must be pointed out that the average student, the vast majority of them, are good young people, respectful, responsible, and dependable, a joy to have in the classroom, due to their undying willingness to listen and learn, to question, respectfully, and answer those questions about subject-related material and even life in general.  The average parent, too, the vast majority, are good people, wanting the best (the much-needed and invaluable book skills and life skills) for their child, so that their child may do well in life and leave a positive mark. Such parents accept no nonsense, disrespect, defiance, and disruptive behavior targeted at anyone, most especially at an adult.   On average, parents are hard-working people, who know that, in order for their children to be productive citizens, both young and old, they must work hard while learning even more than their parents.

But here’s the rub.  The African American elders would call some students “empty barrels” because they “make a lot of noise,” not simply because they don’t know or seem not to know or have basic book and life skills, but also because all too many have decided not to know or use basic book and life skills and deny others that priceless privilege.  Instead of listening and learning, they talk and walk.  Instead of taking notes, they’re passing them.  Instead of being respectful, responsible, and dependable, they are unbelievably and uncontrollably disrespectful, irresponsible, and undependable.  Consequently, they turn the classroom, a one-room temple of learning, into “Class Hell 101”, and laugh, with impunity, and shamelessness about it.

Such inappropriate and ever-increasing behavior in classrooms around the country and, according to the United Nations, around the world, involving virtually all races, ethnicities, and socio-economic and religio-political groups, endangers all concerned.  It endangers the future of the vast majority of students—those who come to school to learn.  It endangers their parents and the overall community because it trashes already limited time for learning from the dedicated classroom teacher, who must devote precious time and energy to address discipline problems.  It also endangers the teacher and all adults, employees and/or visitors at the school because such riotous behavior is a weed-like seed that, if not chopped down, will blossom into a skin-prickling, and maybe life-taking, array of violence.

There is, in my opinion, no need to “study” this matter.  It has been studied to death, and it seems, in the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., that we have been stricken with “the paralysis of analysis.”  As such, instead of addressing the problem head-on, we can’t seem to see the forest for the trees.  The overall solution, though possibly easier said than done, is to make parents and guardians more responsible for their children’s/wards’ behavior. Dedicated classroom teachers should have more say as to how school system-wide codes of student conduct  are devised and enforced. Lastly, the worse behavioral students—the totally incorrigible ones—must be removed from the classroom and, if need be, placed in some other facility, so that the majority of students can learn and the teachers can teach.

Now some may say, “That’s not fair.  Every child can learn”.  To them I say, “True, every child can learn, but not every child wants to learn.  All too many want to stop others from learning.”  By so doing, not only are they forfeiting their future, which, of course, is their choice and their right, but they are also forfeiting the future of the majority of students.  For that act, they have absolutely no right.

Then there are those who say, when, if not after, a disrespectful, disruptive, disobedient, and unruly student has failed, “If the student fails to learn, the teacher has failed to teach.”  That’s another lie.  The average teacher goes above and beyond the call of duty to help any and all students to learn and understand the subject matter at hand.  What happens in all too many cases is that some students, even in the worse academic standing, refuse to listen and learn, not because of some psychological disease—ADD, ADHD, etc.—but because they have simply chosen not to do so.  They have been led to believe, it seems, that someone or something owes them something.  And nothing could be further from the truth.

In all honesty, I must sadly say, some of the worse cases involve girls.  Are mommas and grandmothers and aunts and church ladies not teaching them what it means to be a lady—respectful, responsible, and dependable, decent in dress, speech, and overall behavior?  Has the same happened with the boys?  Have all too many daddies, granddaddies, uncles, church elders (deacons, preachers, or otherwise) not spent enough time with them?  It seems that way.

If it is that way, what are we going to do about it?  Let things stay as is?  Whereas some may concern themselves with would-be thugs killing our precious sons or daughters, it could be worse.  Those sons and daughters could end up marrying them.  Think about it.

If you are serious, you will do something about it.  You will do any and all things that you can to reign our youth back in, to return order to our homes, churches, and schools and to our overall community.  Let’s put our youth lovingly in check.  If not, we will write a huge “check” that our backsides cannot cash—our own destruction.  For the old African proverb is as true today as it ever was, “The destruction of a nation begins in the homes of its people.”  And Harold Melvin and the Bluenotes were right, “The world won’t get any better if we just let it be.” 

Will we just let it be?  The choice is ours.  So are the consequences.  Time will tell.

Remember this: when the good, dedicated and caring Black classroom teachers—those who make it possible for college and university professors (who often view such teachers as the lowly, step-children of the education profession) to look so good are gone, the Black youth, elders, and the community are gone.  Why? because a major piece of its backbone will be gone.

Oh, sure, someone—usually less dedicated and caring—may replace them and surely that will cause the number of students on the honor roll to swell.  But when the smoke clears and all is said and done, all too many African (Black) students will know very little of anything worthwhile and will be prepared even less for the “real world.” The "real world" is that which is outside of both home and school, where excuses for poorly done, if not undone, work are unacceptable. It is where expectations of African (Black) youth are still expected to be two or more times as good as their non-African (European or Asian) counterparts, just to be able to obtain even a small portion of the credit and cash for their often-heralded, though frequently miniscule, achievements.

Please consider all these things: our youth’s future, our future, our world’s future.  And, when you do, I am sure that you will make every effort possible to stand behind and beside your friendly, neighborhood, dedicated school teacher. You will do any and all things necessary to make sure that he/she receives any and all support from home, church, and school that he/she needs to provide all students who are both willing and able to learn, despite whatever handicaps they may face, to learn all they can, to be all they can, and to help as many other people as they can, in making our world much better than it is.

In short,  realize as one wise person once said, “Without the teaching profession there would be no other professions” Although teachers, on average, don’t make a lot of money, they make something even more important; they make a difference.

So let us not only thank teachers by giving them our unbridled support when they are right and lovingly correct them when they are wrong (just as they do so many of their students). Let's make their jobs easier by daily demanding of ourselves and our youth that they behave in a respectful, responsible, and dependable manner.  And stress to them, in the words of the late but great Black Baptist minister and Congressman Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., “Learn, baby, Learn….Because when you learn, baby, learn, you can earn, baby, earn….For the white man respects only your vote and your dollar.” .” And how those are used, brothers and sisters, is based on your education, which stems not only from home but also from the dedicated classroom teacher.

BC Columnist HAWK (J. D. Jackson) is a priest, poet, journalist, historian, African-centered lecturer, middle school teacher and part-time university history instructor. Click here to contact HAWK.