Our teachers are expected to work at all hours for an average salary of P27,000-P64,000, depending on their rank. They could earn more elsewhere: new teachers in the US, for example, get the equivalent of P189,000 on average. Our educators, in general, are underpaid and overworked multitaskers.
When COVID came, they were thrust into a world that had neither been predicted nor mapped with precision. They had to move their classes online, which was problematic from both a pedagogical and logistical perspective.
Online classes work best with stable internet connections, and when students are highly motivated to learn. Our educators had to hold online classes, for all grades from primary to graduate school, with resentful, disengaged students, in a country whose internet connection ranges from slow to spotty.
Our teachers made do with our resources, used their gifts. Some made songs out of their lessons, others delivered their online lectures with brave excitement, and still, others visited students in their homes to ensure that class materials were distributed and answered.
All this, while the government agency that supposedly saw to their needs also issued laptops that were unwieldy, outdated, and overpriced.
All this, while they had to teach children who knew that they could not go out and play with their classmates, but who did not have a full understanding of the repercussions of their confinement.
All this, while they had to deal with young adults whose previously hidden psychological woes suddenly surfaced in their isolation: some were so anxious that they could not work, others were kept at home with abusive families, and still, others were forced to understand information, even when they could barely understand themselves.
And, as election season came, our educators had taken on yet another uneasy role—the voice against the rising tide of disinformation.
They were mocked, laughed at, called purveyors of fake news, even as they worked with facts that had long been established and substantiated. They contended with a culture that looked down on the childlike gifts of curiosity and critical thinking. They battled against people increasingly losing trust in the news and turning to online sensations that had neither credibility nor genuine compassion.
Read more:
Honor and respect for our educators | Inquirer Opinion
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