For years we have been spoon-fed false narratives about teachers and the education system by the media. Through metaphors, stories, films- all forms of communication- we’ve been convinced that a good teacher is someone who sacrifices everything they have in order to benefit their students. I, too, fell victim to this ideology growing up and though I hate to admit it, part of me still longs for the teacher-savior metaphor to be at least a little bit true. So yes, these metaphors do in fact impact the self-perception and worldviews of newly hired teachers, as well as anyone else who is unfamiliar to the profession. Isn’t it interesting how these beliefs carry on with us throughout the years, yet no one claims to have had a teacher who doubled as a hero in the eyes of all their students? As Janet Alsup explains, “because standards of performance are so high, and the price of service is so great, few teachers are awarded this hero status; the rest are labeled mediocre at best, or simply inadequate” (2006). In other words, since we’ve created such high expectations for what a “good” teacher consists of, we tend to label the majority of them as average, if not plain bad.
As a society, we should most definitely hold our educators to a certain standard in order to ensure our students are receiving the education they deserve, but that does not mean we should put all of the pressure on the backs of our teachers. To put it simply, it is absolutely absurd to expect any person to set aside all of their time, effort, and resources strictly to benefit another–unlike Erin Gruwell’s character in Freedom Writers who spends her free time working multiple jobs and volunteering to help her students, not to mention getting a divorce in order to continue her teaching career. And yes, there are many of amazing people who do put in more effort than they are ever expected to, but it is only human nature for people to take care of themselves and their own personal needs over those of someone else. It is entirely unrealistic to expect that much from one single person. This ideology can be harmful for a novice teacher just starting out their career, especially one who has maintained this ideology for their entire life. Being a new teacher and having the impression that you can and must fulfill the teacher-savior metaphor will inevitably lead to being overworked or being utterly disappointed.
Countless films have been made with the teacher-savior as the overarching theme; typically, a new white teacher takes on the challenge of helping a class of struggling, ill-behaved students from poor, urban areas and manages to turn their lives around for the better. For example, Dangerous Minds- though (very) loosely based on a true story- paints a picture that the school is a “war zone” and without LouAnne Johnson to save the day, the students would surely fail on their own. Not only does the teacher-savior metaphor interfere with the teacher’s performance, but it has an effect on the students of said teacher as well. Unfortunately, this kind of sentimental, feel good fable is what the people enjoy. We would rather hear a happy story than one that ends in an overall letdown, so film makers will continue to create fabricated movies with unreasonable and misleading stereotypes of the staff and students because that is what makes them profitable. That is what our society feeds into, and that is what we now hold to be the “truth” about the education system. As Carey Applegate writes, “once the conceptual metaphor of teaching as a sacrifice becomes a relatively well-accepted foundational ideology within an educational organization, we often see this start to shape some of its structural frameworks and policies” (2017, p. 139).
These beliefs have been engrained into our society, and those who don’t necessarily need a “savior” will presumably continue to hold these beliefs throughout their lives. But, as I previously mentioned, these inherently biased expectations impact the students in these situations as well. Oftentimes films portray the struggling students as a poor minority group who have no hope of succeeding without the help of a more privileged teacher (white, middle class, etc.). How is it fair to assume a whole group of students is doomed from the start? Or even self-sufficient from the start? No two people are exactly alike; perhaps one student would benefit more from a “savior-like” teacher while another would do just fine without. You cannot make snap judgements on the needs of a group of people, especially not people who come from different backgrounds and have different life stories, different hardships. Not only that, studies have shown that a teacher’s expectations can influence how a student performs (Spiegel, 2012). If teachers expect their students to do well in school or hold them to higher standards, the students will more likely than not succeed in class, and vice versa. Therefore, in relation to this statement, the teacher-savior metaphor is twice as harmful. If a teacher were to step into a class with the impression that the students will be difficult or dull (Dangerous Minds being a plausible example), those predetermined expectations will undoubtedly reflect in how the students perform in the future.
Once again I’d like to reiterate that the teacher-savior metaphor is destructive to both the educator and the students they are teaching. Not every school has one “good” teacher whose coworkers are all rotten. Not every school has one “bad” class while the rest of the student body manages to follow the rules. You cannot expect a single teacher to “save” every student nor can you expect these students to need saving. With that being said, we need to incorporate new and more realistic metaphors into our depictions of our education system. I’m no expert on the subject, but one education metaphor I found to be enlightening is that teaching is like helping a child learn how to ride a bicycle.
As a teacher it is important to guide your students in their learning, to instruct them and be there if they need help. The time that the child spends practicing riding the bike is more important than how well the instructor shows/explains how to ride the bike (Teachers and Teaching Metaphors, 2008). The intent of this metaphor is to express the idea that it is more important for the student to spend their time practicing and understanding the concepts they are being taught than it is for the teacher to spend too much time over explaining them. If a student continues to struggle with an idea, the teacher can guide them in the right direction once more, but the most important thing will always be the effort the student puts into understanding their lesson.
The bike riding metaphor does not rely on one singular person to make the rest successful, but it illustrates that there needs to be effort coming from both sides: the teacher and the student. If the child does not want to learn how to ride the bike, that doesn’t mean the instructor has failed at their job; but if the child does want to learn, the instructor is an integral part to their success. I think this idea better suits the education system because it is more fair, the only expectation is that both the teacher and the student will put in the effort if they wish to succeed. The bike riding metaphor would be more beneficial for a novice teacher than the teacher-savior metaphor because it does not project impossible expectations on to them before they even begin to fully understand their job as an educator. For instance, if the child were to fall off the bike, the instructor could help them brush it off and get back on, but if the child were to fall and break a bone, it is a doctor’s job to assess the situation and get them the proper help, not the bike riding instructor. As a teacher, you can do your best to help your students in the classroom, but you cannot be the savior in every aspect of their lives. Somethings you cannot control.