Teachers and the American Dream

Esther Wojcicki’s recent commentary in the Huffington Post stands on its own, but several points deserve highlighting. The premise of the article is this: a quality public education is the bedrock of the American Dream. This may not be rocket science, but what it lacks in ingenuity it makes up for in piercing clarity. So often, the media--and politicians of all persuasions--cast our nation’s problems as new and complex thorns in our sides. Certainly, this is true of the economic crisis and other disasters that we hear about so much. But what isn’t new or particularly complicated is the fact that our national promise of equal educational opportunity for all students is not being kept.

Unequal opportunity is antithetical to the American Dream. But this simple truth is overshadowed by our nation’s tempestuous relationship with its teachers, who are being sent dreadfully mixed messages. We can all agree that our education system is not meeting the needs of students, but the problem is made worse when every day teachers are berated for failure to deliver on America’s promise, regardless of the circumstances in which they are working. We in fact tell teachers that they are the problem. And yet, our national rhetoric also flirts with the idea that teachers are nation builders upon whom we are dependent for prosperity. These two storylines are confusing and damaging because, in the midst of their clash, the real issue--lack of systemic support for teachers to be the creative professionals we need them to be--gets drowned out.

Wojcicki highlights a theme present in both of these competing storylines: our superhero complex. The teacher exists in our national rhetoric as a tireless heroine, working alone to educate her students. Many important features are missing from this picture, but I will limit myself to two: 1) context (i.e. Who are her students? What particular challenges do they bring? What does her school look like?) and 2) the value--monetary and cultural--placed on her and her work by society (i.e. How much is she paid? How is her job viewed compared to other jobs?). The American education system and the American public have not figured out how to negotiate these factors or how to integrate them into teaching as a profession.

The American Dream will remain a pipe dream for the underprivileged if we cannot figure out, as a society, how to treat teachers fairly and support them fully to be the providers of opportunity to all. We need to re-fashion the profession of teaching into a creative and rewarding one so that the best and the brightest join the education workforce and enjoy the professional support they deserve.