Teacher Appreciation Week is being celebrated nationally during the week of May 7th.
Now, if Teacher Appreciation Week is meant to inspire students to appreciate their teachers, the timing couldn’t be worse, with class workloads peaking and finals looming.

But admittedly, teachers, like everyone, deserve a little appreciation and recognition. It’s easy to appreciate the teachers we liked and remember fondly. But what about the teachers who we didn’t like?

I had an English teacher in high school who I didn’t really like very much. As is turned out, the feeling was mutual. She was outspoken and emphatic about her political views and they were contrary to my own.

She was quite fond of a few students who I considered to be butt-kissers. And they always got good grades in her class.

However, I always felt like she gave me lower grades than I really deserved, and I have always attributed this to our mutual dislike. I was convinced that her opinion of me affected her opinion of my work.

In hindsight, I would say that was a most valuable experience, because I remember what it felt like to be treated unfairly. I decided I didn’t want to be the kind of person who gives preferential treatment to those who she likes or those who always agree with her.

Furthermore, she is one of the people who helped to teach me that, while I don’t have to love it, I have to accept that life isn’t fair.

Another one of my teacher’s comes to mind as I ponder Teacher Appreciation Week. It was my third grade teacher, Mr. Rhine. As I recall now, it is obvious that he was a wide-eyed idealistic young new graduate when he inherited my class.

But he had no idea what he was dealing with. We had what I’m sure the other teachers considered the class from hell. There were a lot of trouble makers in that class.

It seemed like every morning there was a huge brawl of some sort. I remember one incident where my friend and I were sitting together and talking during story time. Mr. Rhine asked us to be quiet, but we kept talking.

He asked my friend to move to the other side of the group. She refused. They argued for a minute or so and then he came over and picked her up underneath her armpits and moved her to the other side of the group.

I’ll never forget the visual, because while he moved her across the room, she kept her legs folded in the same position as if she was still sitting on the floor.

Sometimes, I was the one perpetrating classroom disturbances, but more often I encouraged the others to do so. And Mr. Rhine knew this.

I can recall more than a few times sitting on the floor in the principal’s office next to the secretary while she shot me mean glances. Then my mother would show up and give me the same ooooh-now-you’ve-really-done-it look.

During one particularly bad day, the usual bad behavior became a complete mutiny. No one listened, no one was sitting down, and there was a lot of nasty back talking – the class was completely out of control. Mr. Rhine started crying and left the room, and the principal came in and took over the class.

Some time later, the principal came to me and said that I had been chosen from all the third graders to be the sole judge in a school writing contest. He said that he had asked all the teachers to select the best writer in their classes, and Mr. Rhine had chosen me.

Afterwards, I found myself feeling guilty about how I had treated Mr. Rhine. There was no reason for him to like me. Even though I didn’t deserve his generosity, he went to bat for me anyway.

Teachers are just people. Sometimes, teachers judge us too harshly, even unfairly, and sometimes they help us even if we don’t deserve it.

During this week dedicated to teachers, I’m pondering some memories of both favorite and not-so-favorite teachers and appreciating them all. We all have to take the bad with the good and appreciate that both have something to teach us.