Rep. Matt Wilhelm (D-Manchester), Rep. Catherine Rombeau (D-Bedford), Rep. Megan Murray (D-Amherst), and Rep. Jackie Chretien (D-Manchester) are NH state representatives.
Everyone remembers a teacher who made their life better. The teacher who provided a safe space to hang out at lunch or after school, the teacher who spent hours giving meaningful feedback on assignments, the teacher who offered extra credit in moments when a grade was slipping, the teacher who noticed a bad day and took the time to check-in, the teacher who made a dull subject fun, or the teacher who inspired your later life’s work.
As parents, we often find ourselves remembering and appreciating the teachers who shaped our own lives as we see first-hand the fantastic job New Hampshire educators are doing for our kids. This week marks National Teacher Appreciation Week. As former students, parents, taxpayers, and legislators, we humbly thank the more than 13,000 Granite State teachers who support our children today.
Our state’s educators spend countless hours grading assignments, planning lessons, buying classroom supplies, coaching sports teams, directing drama productions, facilitating academic clubs, helping with after-school care and more. This week and every week, teachers deserve our gratitude and thanks.
As teachers continue to serve our state and their communities they do so under threat and harassment from the Commissioner of Education Frank Edelblut and Republicans in Concord. The disrespect and distrust of their profession have been especially evident over the last two years as Edelblut and legislative Republicans have relentlessly attacked our teachers. They have worked to restrict the speech of teachers and threaten their reputations. Earlier this year, a conservative activist group offered a “bounty” (their word) to anyone who reported a teacher for teaching accurate history. Two weeks later, the commissioner of education held a photo-op with that same group.
While teachers continue to go above and beyond for their students, a top Republican priority this term is a bill that siphons money out of public schools and uses it to subsidize the tuition of students attending private schools. Nearly $10 million in New Hampshire tax dollars have been removed from public schools through this scheme already this year.
Another priority for Republicans this term is the ban on teachers educating our students about the history and reality of racism, sexism, and gender, and have made it their continued legislative campaign (lookout for it as they knock on your doors this summer.) As parents, this is deeply troubling. We know first-hand the care that educators put into teaching our children and believe it is critical that instruction on American history, civics and sociology not be altered in order to pander to right-wing extremism.
The past two years have placed an enormous strain on our educators. They have endured enormous pressure worthy of our gratitude, not suspicion. New Hampshire’s public schools are among the best in the country, and it is our educators who make them so. We believe, as so many parents in New Hampshire do, that preventing capable teachers from doing their jobs through fear-mongering regulation and legislation is to the detriment of our children’s education and our state’s future.
As parents with children in school, as New Hampshire taxpayers, and as legislators, it is important to us that the schools in our communities be empowered to provide the best quality education for our children to become competitive contributors in higher education, the workplace, and society as a whole. Instead, Republicans have attempted multiple times to undermine school budgets by pulling funding away from our school systems and municipalities while giving tax breaks to big corporations and handouts to private schools.
Frankly, enough is enough. Once again, we say that Granite State teachers deserve our emphatic praise, our support, and our vote for them in Concord. As Benjamin Franklin so aptly stated, “An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.” Happy National Teacher Appreciation Week to New Hampshire’s fearless educators.