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Should each culture honor teachers so students value their education?

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Results so far:

Disagree
17% 59 votes Total: 340 votes
Agree
83% 281 votes
Disagree

Teachers are valuable members of our society. They impart knowledge, skill and act as parents while the children are in their care.

A huge part of me wanted to write to the 'yes' side in this debate but I also believe that good teachers are respected. They are also honored in many ways by children and parents showing gratitude, relatively good pay, status in society and so on.

Therefore, the strict reply to the question is 'no'. They should be thanked and respected but not necessarily honored unless that have done something exceptional.

Take a teacher in the Western world. Teachers have chosen their profession. They have received training and funding. They are paid well and work acceptable hours. They gain respect and status by their efforts and success rates.

Therefore, we should not honor teachers just because the are teachers. Teachers should be part of the means by which students come to value their education. Society should take more responsibility as a whole for student education in all areas and not just honor teachers, who are but one small cog in this process.

On the other hand, if a teacher has striven against the odds, perhaps in a far off culture or in a place where they have been persecuted. Or, where they have taken education to people who otherwise could not find it, then they should be honored, not for simply being teachers but for being people who have the courage to fight for the rights of others and provide them the means with which to fight oppression, hunger and poor living conditions.

Why do I feel this way? Well, I have met too many teachers who consider honor their God- given right. One in particular springs to mind who was for ever telling us of her new qualifications, how she was becoming an ever more 'super' teacher. Yet, she left the school at the first chance of promotion, was unpopular with students and parents alike, punished and isolated children and refused to accept special needs diagnosis. Yet, because of her experience and endless courses and qualifications, she expected honor and if you did not thank her for her time, you were punished by your child being excluded from treats.

Every profession has its bad pennies and teachers like this are bad for the profession so should not get honor.
I think honor should be given where it is due but not considered an automatic right of a teacher.

Students will value their education if that educations gets them places they never thought they would, or opens their minds to ideas they never thought of. They will give honor to and respect those who care, nurture talent, whoever has it and wherever it is and genuinely give of themselves.

So, honor teachers who genuinely deserve it but not for simply being a teacher!

For me , it is interesting because I teach students from all over the world and some of them, notably those from poor countries address me from the start by 'maa'm' or 'venerable tutor' and the like. They seem grateful to be on the course.
Many of those who have access to education on a more ready basis and from more affluent countries go straight to addressing me by my first name.

Respect is given by those grateful and for those less grateful an equality is assumed from the start. Quite which approach I prefer I am not sure but I do find the automatic respect and veneration a little hard, as it gives my such a high place from which to start and I fear I will fail their expectations. It does show , however, how different cultures view teachers.

respect should be earned and honor given to those who truly deserve it so, for a teacher to be given honor just for being a teacher is wrong, while for those who are special and give freely of themselves and encourage others less fortunate, honor us undoubtedly deserved.

Learn more about this author, Sammy Stein.
Contact this writer Click here to send this author comments or questions.

Agree

Yes, teachers should always be honored, because we have all learned something from them, I value teachers very much, and it's a darn
shame they're being bashed around these days.

Also there's allot of violence against teachers, I believe if you kill a teacher, you should get the death penalty, just like you would if you killed a police officer, teachers should have the same respect.
Or if you injure a teacher, you should be doing some time in jail, I don't
if you are in junior high school, or college, if you do the crime, you'll
be doing the time.

Teachers are the backbone of society, without teachers we would be lost.
we would be just a world of ignorant people. Thank God for them.
If it weren't for teachers, I hate to think what would happen to us. We should be giving teachers praise, not mistreating them.

OK there are bad teachers as well, well principals doing the interviews for a teachers position should screen the potential applicant, put them
on a six month probation period, and take it from there.

If you have a list of potential applicants, you can afford to do it this way remember we can't run a school without them, think of all the illiterates we'll have in the streets, it will be like a big plague, and
we will all have to pay for it sooner or later.

We need to encourage children to be teachers too, not just lawyers or doctors, there's too many lawyers, not enough teachers.

Teaching jobs are decreasing not increasing, you have fewer people wanting to be teachers, because they are scared of the junkie students
who are coming to their classes because parents are neglecting to be home for their children, so children have to grow up and be a bunch of gangsters and terrorists.

It's really the fault of the parents that their kids are coming out this way, so I don't blame teachers at all for feeling this way, parents just
don't want to be responsible for their children's education anymore or their
safety either.

Lets try to encourage teachers, by letting them know what a great job their
doing for our kids and how much we appreciate them being there for them. Lets give our teachers the respect that is due to them. And lets tell our
how nice it is to be a teacher when they grow, to encourage them to see teachers as good role models for them.

In this way kids will like and want to be teachers when they grow up, teaching is a great job, it's still a respected job and we still have
have people that want to go to college to get an education in teaching.

I have a niece who's an elementary school teacher, and she's doing just fine we are all very proud of her, she enjoys being a teacher, and she's
a great teacher. She's very dedicated to her job, and never comes late
is always on time, the kids just love her.

As a community we all need to work together to help teachers and encourage them to keep on going and not get discouraged, as parents we should all be
more involved in our children's education, and part of it is taking time to
speak to your kids teachers.

So lets decide today to get more involved in our children's
education, by being more concerned with what goes on in their class
room, I think their teachers will really appreciate this very much
more than any reward they can get, but also I think that teachers
should each year get some recognition by parents as well as the school.

Remember no teachers, no education, no nothing, lets not play with our
children's future, which is in the hands of our teachers and future would
be teacher.

Learn more about this author, Adriana Rojas.
Contact this writer Click here to send this author comments or questions.

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