I Am Not a Hero

It could be that I'm in the middle of teaching T.S. Eliot's "The Hollow Men," but classroom time just hasn't seemed all that worthwhile lately. I remember seeing Dead Poet's Society when I was fifteen and having that crazy, deep-in-the-gut-sense that if I could just get myself into a situation where I could make that sort of difference I'd be happy my whole life. Twenty-some-odd-years later, I've realized the truth about teaching.

Here it is--Hollywood tells these stories about "heroic" teachers because our culture isn't willing to imagine teaching outside of this heroic model. We're big fans of the flash of inspiration, that eureka moment when a student looks up from a piece of homework (beaming of course) and cries, "I understand." We're not such big fans, however, of what it takes to actually get there--long, hard, sometimes mind-numbingly dull hours of work and practice.

I don't care what you saw Jaime Escalante do in Stand and Deliver or Erin Gruwell do in Freedom Writers, Rocky-style training montages don't cut it. In fact, the real-life Gruwell was only in the classroom for five years. Most teachers I know clocked that before they finished their degrees and got their "real" jobs. Our society treats teachers like heroes because heroes do it for the satisfaction. I am not a hero. I am a highly trained professional, with a specific and necessary skill set. It's nice that my job (like most) comes with occasional moments of satisfaction, but I wouldn't last long if my only reward was "satisfaction." Students come and go--most of them are hardly memorable.

Ultimately, my commitment is to the knowledge. I try to pass it on in the hopes that it will exist for at least one more generation. I hope to stave off the next Dark Age just that much longer.

This is the way the class ends
This is the way the class ends
This is the way the class ends
Not with a bell, but a whimper