After the Georgia legislature recently passed the mandatory class size requirements, there obviously will be some good as well as bad news. Students and teachers will be seeing fewer individuals in their respective classes.

With the passing of the summer break, it just might be a good time to look at how our teachers are preparing for the new school year.

Eight years before I retired as a high school teacher, my principal asked me to become the chairperson of our faculty. Our high school had over 2,500 students and the unique baccalaureate program. The school was one of 22 high schools located in the fourth largest school district in the nation.

Needless to say my tenure presented the unique opportunity to observe a large numbers of teachers pass through our school.

Throughout my teaching career I witnessed many so-called academic innovations: e.g., schools without walls, content rich curriculum, new math, phonics, same-gender schools, school choice, block scheduling, year-round schools, vouchers, etc.

The one and only constant in all of these innovations was the teacher in the front of the classroom.

I found that almost half of our new teachers left teaching within the first three years of teaching.

It was to these new teachers that I wrote the following letter in the hope of giving them some perspective on the profession, what the profession expected from them and what they could expect from the profession.

I presented the letter to our entire faculty, both experienced and neophyte teachers.

Much to my surprise, I received as much positive feedback from the experienced teachers as I did from the new teachers.

Letter to a new teacher

Your appearance at the first faculty meeting of the year brings back memories that are among the best in my life and are, in fact, the substance upon which a large part of my life has been based. I truly envy the myriad of experiences that await you and wish that I could experience them with you again.

You may find that there are those who will upset you by making jokes about new teachers. Remember, you, the new teacher, are the life’s blood of the teaching profession and actually hold a remarkable position of tremendous responsibility. You bring us new ideas and a boundless source of energy.

As I reflect about the relatively short time I have been in teaching, I wish that I had known more about the profession before I started my career. I have now come to understand it better and want to share my experiences with you.

Education is often viewed as a pyramidal structure with the superintendent at the top, all the teachers at the base, and everyone else in the middle. Yes, it is pyramidal in structure, but one that stands on its point. At the top is the broad base made up of all the administrators and a myriad of support personnel. In the middle are those of higher rank whose purposes are to coordinate activities, supply materials, and supervise those of us who actually do the teaching. If there were no need for these support functions, education could very well be composed of only teachers. Keeping the pyramid on its point helps remind us of who the important players are and where their priorities should lie. Teachers are the points of contact for learning.

One might view teachers as points on a Bell curve with the vast majority in the center doing a credible job. Those on the left, the profession might be better off without; those on the right (the professionals) are the wonder workers who make learning an incredible experience for the students.

Efforts should be directed toward becoming one of the teachers on the right. A marginal employee in any position is disdained by all, but a true professional fills the hearts of peers, supervisors and, most of all, students with the joy of learning.

A teacher should have ambition — not for higher rank, but to be the most professional teacher possible. Your focus must be on realizing that you can remain classroom teacher for 30 years and still grow as a professional teacher. You will find that there are teachers who flaunt their years of experience, when they may only have one or two “years of experience” repeated many times over.

Each year you should make every effort to reflect on that year and say, “Now that the year is over, what could I have done to have made the year better for my students?”

Notice that I wrote, “What could I have done to have made the year better for my students?” not, “What could I have done to have made the year better for myself?” If you take care of your students, you will take care of yourself and you will find it very satisfying to care for students.

When considering status or position in the hierarchical structure, you should be aware those teachers, principals, and superintendents are all certified by the state. The state expects just as much dedication, integrity, intelligence, and loyalty from its teachers as it does from the superintendent.

While the superintendent administers to the entire school district or county by virtue of his/her position, the teacher is at the point of decision, the classroom. The curriculum specialists may provide educational plans for each subject, but the battle of learning is won or lost by the classroom teacher.

Teachers at all levels of experience should remember that true professional competence is the only yardstick by which they are measured and that both parents and student expect the same competency from everyone. With this in mind, it is clear why those who are concerned about their hierarchical status fail to gain the respect of their fellow teachers and those they teach.

Students are the focal point. You are going to walk into your classroom with many questions about your students. Additionally, students will have many questions about you, their teacher. “Does the new teacher know the subject?” “Whose interests does the teacher have?” ”Will the teacher stand up for us when it is appropriate?” “How much moral courage does the teacher have?” “Is the teacher fair?”

There will be endless questions because you are so enormously important to them. As your student, they thirst for something special in you. They want pride in themselves, pride in their class and pride in you. They want “their” teacher to be the best. They want someone they can tell their parents about. They want this because they are students.

They want to remember you years from now. When reminiscing with a friend at the class reunion, they will speak admiringly of “you,” their teacher, who may only have been a few years older than they were when you first taught them. It won’t matter; you were their teacher, who knew how to teach and take care of “your” students.

The desire that students have to admire their teachers is very humbling. No matter how much you do for them, you will always wish you could do more. You have a great gift to give, and in giving you will be rewarded more than you can possibly imagine. I know this is a heavy burden, but that is what being a professional is all about.

You also have been told that a teacher should not become too familiar with the students. Basically this is true; however, communication is not familiarity. Take every opportunity you can to really talk ”with” your students. It can be small talk about their families, where they work (and you will find that a large number of your students do work), or what plans they have after they graduate.

Take the time to communicate and tutor informally about whatever subject arises in conversation. Always be teaching. If students have special areas of expertise, be wise enough to ask them to teach you. Students will then trust you because they know you will listen, and not be afraid to tell you when you are about to make a mistake.

Students will scrutinize the way you dress, your bearing, the way you handle the disruption in the classroom, and most of all how you handle the disciplinary problems that often arise. Nothing will escape their knowing eyes and everything will be discussed. They may occasionally use rough language when they think you are not listening, but they will look down on you if you were to use the same language. They expect more of you, particularly in the area of self-discipline.

Students want you to make them feel like real people. You can learn to place the right inflection on the words you use when they perform in class and fill them with pride. Your students need to know that they are not just individual sitting at a desk but that they are participants in the learning process. Your manner will determine what they think of themselves as players on your stage: a stage you provide for them. Make sure they get to play their individual parts.

Don’t be one of those teachers who think education if for teachers and the students are just a means to an end. Students are the reason you are in the classroom. Place them in the center of the stage, let them act their parts, and their accomplishments will fill your heart.

When one of your students does something significant, you have the power to add to the student’s accomplishment. Write short notes to parents, telling them the pride you have in their child’s accomplishment. Be particularly careful in writing the notes, because they may spend many years in a treasured scrapbook and become the source of conversations among people you will never know.

You will also find that time is your most precious commodity. Give all you can to your students to explain, to listen and to teach.

Don’t ever digress from the highest standards of morality, honesty, and selflessness. If you do, you will steal the students’ confidence in you, and may rob yourself of the opportunity to be a professional.

There will be frustrations. The time will come when you think that the most important task you perform is to take attendance. But, at every graduation there will always be someone who stops and tells you, “We sure had a good class.”

To be entrusted with the education of the nation’s sons and daughters is the ultimate obligation, and nothing you do in life will be so demanding, so rewarding, or create more memories than your time as a teacher. Professional ability and attitude, in the end, is its own reward. This is the difference between a “careerist” and a professional.

Welcome to “our” profession.

John A. Milani, teacher
Peachtree City, Ga.

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