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If you’re an eduwriter with an article deadline or column thinking, “I know; I will write about how unreasonable teachers are being to consider their safety before returning to school and how that obviously means they don’t care about kids,” I really suggest you do not do that.
I’ve had these conversations DAILY since March with my colleagues. All the options are fraught with consequence. Some will stay to support their family or because they can’t give up this job they love. Some will leave for health reasons or to watch their own kids. All are valid.
Not ONE of these choices are easy to make. Not one of them are teachers making with a lack of awareness about how many people their decision will impact and how long reaching the impact of that choice will be. We have weighed these factors hourly in our minds. Endlessly.
I want to end by talking about Susan Silk’s ring theory. The concept is the closer to an event or issue you are, the smaller your ring. If it’s happening to you, you’re in the inner ring. You can “dump out” to more outer rings - those less immediately affected.
This can be fear, concern, judgment or criticism - anything. But the more outer rings cannot dump IN. It isn’t their place to put THEIR fears/concerns/judgment about “it”on those who are dealing with “it” more closely, more intimately, more personally. It can be used here too.
If you’re not in the inner ring deciding between job or family, financial survival or health, love of your job or health, your kids or your students, your fears or your other fears, it is deeply unnecessary to dump in on those who are from your position in the outer ring.
So when asked to write that article, the one that frames teachers as being opposed to what kids need, that frames teachers as unreasonable, or unmeasured in their concerns, that needlessly pits them as the adversaries of parents and a functioning society, reconsider. Please.
