World Teachers' Day

October 5th

World Teacher’s Day

Did you know that in 1966 The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization declared the status for teachers. October 5th is World Teachers’ Day.

On this day we celebrate all teachers around the globe. This day commemorates the anniversary of the adoption of the benchmarks regarding the rights and responsibilities of teachers, and standards for their initial preparation and further education, recruitment, employment, and teaching and learning conditions. It is a day to celebrate how teachers are transforming education but also to reflect on the support they need to fully deploy their talent and vocation, and to rethink the way ahead for the profession globally.

Education itself must be transformed. In this transformation of education, teachers need to play a central role, as witnessed at the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic. Teachers have reinvented their role in order to face changing and emerging demands. Most of them had to re-organize and adapt teaching and learning processes, particularly related to online and remote education. They had to take part in the activities to safeguard the material safety of learners and their families, providing socioemotional and psychological support to students and their families.

This editor knows that teachers should be supported and empowered to innovate and transform their teaching from within. Do not tell us what we need to do. We already know what to do. We are the ones that are in the trenches of this system. Please stop writing scripts for us to follow. Teachers are not puppets and neither are the students to be read to. Throw scripted educational curriculum away. Why get a teacher certified if all we have to do is read a script to teach Reading, Math and Science. Not saying much for what is going on in the field of Social Studies. We have no idea how those in power think about changing our history. You can’t change history. We know what has happened. Just look around at the institutions that surround our education system.

I say let teachers do what they do best, which is teach! Let students learn from the experts that the higher education system created them to be. If curriculum is being created so that teachers

read the scripts then that doesn’t say very much for the teachers’ pedagogical education that our universities are instilling to our future educators. Are universities lagging behind in the curriculum that they are using?

The system says that our students are entitled to an adequate number of qualified teachers with access to quality initial education and continuous professional development throughout their careers, improved status, and working conditions. Then why have professional development if all we need to do is read a script to teach?

Where is a pedagogical best practice where it says that you read the script and internalize it to regurgitate to our students. We need solid lesson plans to follow. Students need to know what the lesson objective is.

The COVID-19 pandemic showed us that teachers are ready, willing and very capable to transform education. However, education systems do not seem to be equally ready to support teachers to fully deploy their talent, their knowledge, and make use of their pedagogical judgment to transform education to fit their needs and those of their students.

Our education system needs to let go of the strings that bind our teachers from transforming the lives of our students. This transformation relies on innovations in classrooms, schools, and

education systems as a whole. In order to be able to bring innovative pedagogies and practices into classrooms, teachers need an environment that values the autonomy and leadership necessary to seize opportunities to depart from established practice. Teachers are the engines at the heart of our education systems, without whom it is impossible to provide an inclusive and equitable quality education to every learner. Living through the Covid experience through 2019-2022 has made us aware of our fragility and interconnectedness that teachers have had to adjust and accommodate while caring for their families.

As the airline stewardess states, “in case of an emergency, you should take care of yourself first by putting on your oxygen mask before taking care of those around you”. I plead with those that are in the position of authority to please let our teachers teach. The scores will speak for themselves. We can only cope with these 21st century challenges, such as climate change, rising inequalities, test scores, and rapid technological change if we work together. Teachers and students will flourish in an educational environment that takes care of those that are molding the future of our great country to make our country Great Again.