The Teacher Factor

Of all that I’ve debated in my mind over the past few weeks, one thing has remained absolutely constant: good teachers, teachers who believe in what they are doing and constantly strive for excellence, are crucial for student learning. There is no replacement for a truly good teacher.

Today I had the privilege of giving my class a tour of my old high school, DSST Stapleton. I have mixed feelings about DSST as an institution – I truly believe that it is providing students with opportunities for college and beyond who wouldn’t have otherwise had those possibilities, but at the same time I can’t help but question some of its methods. Most of these methods revolve around its strictness, overwhelming focus on academics, and refusal to acknowledge the importance of athletics and the arts. While at DSST, my class met with Bret Poppleton, who has taken on a number of roles at DSST but is currently the dean of students, and Katherine Hendrickson, who taught me for two years and is currently in her fifth year teaching at DSST. I walked out of that meeting with an affirmed belief that those two teachers, among several others, made me a better person.

Hendrickson told our class very bluntly that initially, I was one of her most difficult students, and I think that Poppleton would agree that my attitude throughout high school greatly inhibited my ability to connect with others, particularly my teachers. Today, I really do think that people would describe me as charismatic and open-minded – a huge shift in just a couple of years. This attitude shift, which was 100% influenced and supported by my teachers at DSST, has allowed for both personal and academic growth in my time since graduating high school.

I see this positive influence just as much in my classroom at DDES. Julia Behringer, who graduated from college in 2012, is in her second year teaching at DDES. Earlier this week, she led professional development seminars at a national Expeditionary Learning conference in Boston. Her students, whom she treats with respect and pure love, absolutely adore not only her, but their fellow classmates, their school, and learning itself. On one of the first days that I shadowed her classroom, Julia explained to me how hard it was to put herself through school and teacher training programs, and how she is so grateful that today she is able to focus on just one thing: being with her students and helping them learn. In my eyes, this might be the most admirable thing that a teacher can say. So why aren’t more teachers like this?

Julia holds her student, Mya's, handwritten book as Mya reads it aloud to the class. Julia has her students take turns sharing their writing each day.

Katherine Hendrickson, along with many others, will tell you: teaching is exhausting. To be able to give so much of yourself to students day after day, year after year, is a quality that even the best teachers struggle with. It is exhausting, in all capacities. And for many, it is not sustainable.

DSST provides its students with a plethora of areas for academic and personal growth, but teachers are burning out. DSST has a 100% college acceptance rate, yet one of the lowest teacher retention rates. Our vision of a great teacher is a generous, kind, and intelligent person – one who provides our children with all of the emotional and intellectual support that they need in life. And we believe that this teacher should be able to not only provide these things for one student, but for twenty, fifty, even one hundred students at a time. And they should continue doing this for their entire lives.

Yes, this is the teacher that I want my children to have - the teachers that I see in Katherine and Julia. But this is not a realistic vision; even these two admirable teachers can't devote that much of their emotional and physical well-being for years on end. Before we even go near reforming schools themselves, we need to rethink the “teacher” model. Can all of this responsibility truly fall onto one person? Our children, and our teachers, deserve more than that.