So far on Guerre and Shalom’s EDUCATION FORTNIGHT:
ARTICLE 1 (On university scholarship):
ARTICLE 2 (On Free/Charter schools and State partnerships with the private sector):
ARTICLE 3 (On behaviour in the classroom and the reality of modern teaching):
In ARTICLE 4 (On civics education, student activism, graduation ceremonies and teaching liberal democracy):
In today’s ARTICLE 5, we speak about teacher status….
“The Decline of Teaching” by Daniel Clarke-Serret
According to the Torah, Moses was the greatest prophet that ever emerged among the people of Israel; for it was only he that knew the Lord “face to face”. Yet despite being bestowed with such an honour by the Holy text, the Jewish people do not describe the great man as “Moses the Prophet”. For whilst Elijah, Jeremiah and the rest of the prophetic patheon are known as “(insert name) the Prophet”, Moses is granted the most magnificent of honorifics. He is known simply as “Moshe Rabenu”. Or in English, “Moses the TEACHER”. In the traditional world view of the Jewish people, teachers make prophets look low status.
And so it continues to this day, with the religious leaders of the Jews being known as Rabbis, or teachers. In Temple times, there were priests and scribes and prophets. Yet the Rabbi is none of the above. He is a humble teacher; a transmitter of tradition.
But how the mighty have fallen. Because in modern day Israel, if you want to scrape a living as a low status professional, then teaching is the profession for you. The lack of honour accorded to the modern teacher, replete with low pay, terrible conditions and constant disrespect from pupils and parents alike, would make a modern day Moses weep.
The (lack of) importance with which teachers are seen can be seen in how Jews speak of Maimonides (Rambam), the Spanish-born giant of Jewish law. Although Maimonides saw himself as a writer, philosopher and teacher above all, the Jews of today are more likely to make reference to the fact that he was a physician to the world famous Kurdish-Egyptian Sultan Saladin. What an insult! Because for Moshe ben Maimon himself, it was of immense pain that he even had to enter the medical profession.
With the death of his merchant brother David, who died when his ship sank in the Indian Ocean, the Rambam no longer had a financial backer to support his public intellectualism. With tears, he was obliged to enter a lucrative trade, that of a doctor, with which to support his family. So hard did he work, that he was no longer able to write and teach as much as he wished. Yet the feckless modern observer - status-obsessed and starry eyed - carelessly fetes the Rambam’s medical position, of high social importance in the celebrity court of Saladin, and gleefully ignores his actual vocation.
The medical “discoveries” of Maimonides soon became passé, yet his synthesis of Aristotle with Jewish tradition remain of great philosophical importance to this day; while his insistence on rationalism over superstition is to be celebrated with the loudest of voices. And of course his religious works are still followed by the observant. Yet still I hear about ''Maimonides the Doctor”!
Medicine evolves with time leaving the findings of the past to be hopelessly outdated. Would you want to be treated by the Rambam? But knowledge is different. It compounds. What was learnt in past is an essential building block for what we know now. In the words of Newton, we all stand upon the shoulders of giants.
A teacher is the transmitter of that knowledge. And yet… What a sad state of affairs we have reached. Today the doctor is of such high status over the teacher that we celebrate medieval medicine over modern pedagogy,
And it isn’t just in Israel. Throughout the Western World the days where teachers surpassed prophets are long past. In today’s era, the teacher is no longer the repository of knowledge nor the transmitter of tradition; neither the law giver nor the rule setter. The teacher is the public servant who follows the rules set by others.
Bankers and lawyers sitting in Parliament tell teachers what to teach in minute detail. We are told how many hours to impart this subject and the exact information to transmit in that subject. We are ordered by parents to do this and school managers to do that. It is for the lawmaker; even the ignorant mother to tell us what to do— and if we do not meet the expectations of others, it is us that faces the wrath of society.
With each new passing fad or fashion, the content of the curriculum is to change. Tradition and the body of knowledge no longer informs our vocation; instead it is ideologies and political expedience that rules the day. The behaviour displayed by pupils towards the average teacher is indicative of our new, lower place in society. For whilst pupils would listen in hushed silence to a football star or a political neophyte, a teacher of long standing is to be ignored, harassed and hounded.
Technology is the newest bete noir to face the work-laden teacher. No longer are teachers the bringers of knowledge or the gateway to success. All that one needs to know is now on the internet and within the reach of all. Teachers are increasingly reduced to facilitators; instructors on how to best use the shiny new tools at our disposal. And thus our status tumbles further. Even the lowest of the low look down upon us with barely-concealed contempt.
Modern attitudes are summed up by one famous commercial. The UK government, attempting to hire more educators, launched a campaign “Those who can, teach”. It was derided. The contemptuous masses replied “Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach”.
We are in the midst of a crisis. Salaries have stagnated, but expectations are ever growing. Our purpose is in doubt, and our place in society at rock bottom. It is not the purpose of this article to speak about solutions from the perspective of the classroom. There is much that teachers can do, and indeed are doing right now, to incorporate technology in ever-more effective ways. And I can sincerely say that the skill levels of teachers - in terms of effective assessment, inclusion of those with special needs, the breaking down of the boundaries between different disciplines, giving feedback and more - has never been higher. Progress and attainment are genuinely improving, and I report this from the perspective of teaching both in the UK and Spain.
But this isn’t a teaching journal. Getting into the weeds of classroom practice would be like a computer expert waxing lyrical in a gardening magazine. Speaking about Bloom's Taxonomy, and refocusing the teaching profession from knowledge to synthesis, would be like speaking of taxidermy to a florist The issue being addressed here is status. And status is an issue for us all.
Re-raising the status of teachers from the trash bins of Skid Row to the heights of Sinai is to reconnect to that which made Moshe Rabenu a teacher. It is more than increasing pay to somewhere closer to that of the sainted doctors. It is rather remaking the connection between teaching and lawgiving.
Today, as already described, it is the teachers who are dictated to. There is no person in society who feels unqualified to tell us what to teach their children. The conservatives may want more religion, the businessmen may want more practical skills, and the progressive may want more woke. But what do WE want? Shouldn’t it be the teachers who are given the status to decide? Like the Rabbis, shouldn’t it be the teacher who decides on the rules of education and transmission of tradition?
What I propose, with the greatest of humility, is that teachers should be given a much more prominent place in our legislatures. There should be a set number of parliamentary seats that only teachers may occupy. Only a teacher may become the education minister. And political parties should be given a financial bonus when they select a teacher for parliamentary candidacy over someone from another profession.
Where there is a competition between two equally qualified candidates, the political parties should be incentivized to choose the teacher. If one has an unelected second chamber - basically the UK - seats should be reserved for teachers who have attained high renown with the profession —and teacher MPs should be paid more than non-teacher MPs. Teaching should be seen as a prerequisite for ascent to legislator not as a matter of law, but as a matter of convention and financial encouragement.
Now these are ideas. I haven’t sat down and worked out the ins and outs of this proposal. But the effect of such a development would be to transform the status of teaching. Teachers would still, of course, be paid less than bankers and (no doubt) doctors. But they would be of higher status. Suddenly all the great and good of our society will want to qualify as teachers. Suddenly children will respect us. Suddenly parents would understand our vocations as ones of importance. And suddenly it would be teachers who would decide upon the rules for the transmission of knowledge.
It would be transformational. Teachers would turn into Rabbis. Rabbis would ascend Sinai and turn into Moshes. And the Republic of the (democractically-elected) Philosopher Kings will have arrived.
Knowledge, truth and education would be ruler of all, and money - still a valid option for those who seek financial enrichment - would be the goal of those who seek a lower status path. It would change our world. So are you ready to make the change?
I also wanted to mention and I do apologize for bringing this up again, that I left those two comments on your article on the imperfect good and the clear evil.
👏👏👏 A clarion call to restore the dignity to the field of teaching it once held, Daniel! An excellent article every educator in the western world should read!