Teaching: A Profession Under Attack

By Giselle Arechiga, November 25th 2024 

The teaching profession is currently experiencing its lowest levels of employment in the last 50 years. Since the 1970s, the occupation employment has dynamically declined and increased throughout each decade in America.   

Kristi Maris was a former teacher at the First Baptist Academy in Baytown, Texas, where she dedicated roughly 20 years of her life to, was fired abruptly after attending a Drag show.  

 This is just one of the devastating examples many educators have to face in an already demanding job, along with the teaching of various core subjects to children with varied academic and emotional needs-which has been a huge challenge since the aftermath of covid in 2020.  

 I had the opportunity to interview Mrs. Wilson, a 10-year teaching veteran here at East High to reflect on the impact COVID-19  had on students coming back from online. “I think we're going to be studying the impacts of COVID for many years to come, whether it's somebody's inability to connect with other people, or feeling really isolated and alone.”  

 School is a very social environment where students are able to communicate with their peers around to gather information or help but with the impact COVID had on many students we can see the lack of participation and effect on grades. Along with the amount of work and time teachers put into trying to teach these students basic skills over again after quarantine. Time and effort that is taken for granted by many, so much where many teachers around the country were pushed to their limit by these setbacks and quit. 

Mrs. Wilson also brought up a very interesting point about the lack of interest in teaching. 

“I don't think it's a lack of interest, I think it's a lack of respect we as a society in the states anyways have towards educators, if you go outside of the states, it's one of the highest regarded professions and treated as such”  

Going through history in the late 1800s where primary and secondary teaching became solely a woman's occupation, we can still see this patriarchal sexism placed in our society today with the salary, but the more concerning issue is the upright lack of respect and gratitude towards our teachers.  

I also interviewed Mrs. Arrington here at East High whose been teaching for an impressive amount of 15 years and she agrees with the statement that teaching isn't a dying profession rather one under attack. 

 “I think we see that with the current rising administration, that was just elected wanting to do away with the Department of Education, I think also with the rise of more charter schools, parochial schools and private schools.” 

 Getting rid of the Education Department is hardly a new idea. Republicans have been trying to campaign against the agency since 1979 when it was created, the main argument being how the agency’s existing violates the Constitution. 

 This is why it is so important we as a society need to give teachers the respect they need, teachers that shape the minds and lives of the upcoming generations, that go beyond their pay grade and continue to work for the passion of supporting their students. And teachers that shouldn't have to worry about getting fired because of the idea of self-expression or taking a passage from a Novel that goes against what the legislation views as “unfit”.