Dear Diane,
It has been wonderful reading all those reflections from your readers. Thank you so much for offering such a space for social dialogue.
In “America’s Teachers: Heroes or Greedy Moochers at the Public Trough?” (http://www.nationofchange.org/america-s-teachers-heroes-or-greedy-moochers-public-trough-1355674260), Dave Lindorff quotes a man demonizing public school teachers “in an attitude all too typical of many Americans’ thinking” and questions:
“Some of those ‘non-revenue-generating’ unionized teachers, and the school’s non-revenue-generating principal, just died defending those kids. I wonder if their tax-obsessed critics would have done the same?”
Reading this article made me think of how important it is to build teaching profession that celebrates teachers who think of teaching as their life work… rather than a simple stepping stone for their career. The message of those brave Sandy Hook teachers is clear: “We will never leave you and always fight for you.”
What kind of teachers do we want as a society?
Daiyu Suzuki
Doctoral student, Teachers College
Co-founder of Edu4
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I agree that we need to celebrate the hard work our teachers do rather than blame them, like many people and school reformers do, for all of society problems and try to take all of their job security away so they can become another throw away workforce. My mother has taught kindergarten for almost 30 years and I think she deserves a pat on the back rather than a kick to the curb. I love teachers and think that the rhetoric of bad teachers does not place blame on the education system and the government for the lack of support they give to our teachers which causes burn out and high turnover. Our youth need consistant and passionate teachers and the system is responsible for providing teachers with the training and support to do their jobs well. Here an article that seems to connect to the point at hand: http://classroomstruggle.org/2012/04/17/the-onslaught-against-schoolteachers-needs-to-stop/ . There are a lot of other good articles on the topic at this site as well.
Being a teacher is all I have ever wanted to do with my LIFE. It saddens me that the so-called ‘reformers’ find me with my years of experience a ‘liability’ – economically and in my pedagogy. It is places like this where I find that not everyone feels this way, and for that I am eternally grateful.
Indeed. Those teachers laid down their lives for children and in the process, saved others by slowing down the gunman. They are heroes and exemplars of selfless good who put most of our “get your own at anybody’s expense” world to shame. And they were union members.
Great article, thank you. I’ll be forwarding this to several colleagues.