What Teachers Need To Hear From Administrators At The End Of The Year

“You all have made it to the end of another school year, and I want you to know: I have seen your sacrifices.

I have not seen all of your sacrifices, but I have seen some of them.

I have not seen all of your sacrifices because you are virtuous men and women, which means you do not make a show of your good works. You have been insulted by parents and said nothing about it. You have been insulted by students and said nothing about it. You have been insulted by one another and said nothing about it. You have even been insulted by me and said nothing about it.

You have been insulted so many times that you have quit keeping count. In the beginning, you complained, but the insults kept coming, your complaints got you nowhere, and now you have humbly accepted that such insults are simply part of your job. You receive praise, too, of course, but praise doesn’t keep you up at night. But you have lost much sleep thinking about the ways you have been slighted, and you have come to work the following day tired and dejected. For all the sleep you have lost worrying about your students, praying for your students, or grinding your diamond frustrations into dust, thank you. I cannot repay you, but the Lord will recompense you with rest in Glory.

You have worked hard while at school and continued working hard when you got home. You have spent money on your students just to bless them and not asked for reimbursement. You have spent time preparing gifts, food, and needlessly extravagant lessons for your students. You have labored diligently when you could have phoned it in. For this, I thank you.

Let me speak honestly: there are many people who are necessary in order for this school to run smoothly, and a school is definitely a team, but it is you—the teachers—who actually make classical Christian education happen. You are what make it possible for this school to call itself a classical Christian school. The buck stops with you. If the building is classical, the handbook is classical, the curriculum is classical, the ads are classical, and the uniforms are classical, but the teachers aren’t, then the school isn’t giving anyone a classical education. Everything else is expendable. Plato’s Academy didn’t have any of those things. The Lord didn’t have any of those things during His earthly ministry. You, the teachers, are this school’s most precious and vital asset…”

-read the rest of the speech here (my latest for CiRCE)