...has not a single thing to do with Tim Walz himself, about whom I could not be more enthusiastic--here's a gift link to the Washington Post talking about him as a social studies teacher, plus here is more from The New York Times, and I hope by now you've seen the video of his signing Minnesota's free lunch bill--but an implicit comment from my fellow educators about his being a social studies teacher.
It goes something like this: of COURSE he was a social studies teacher! He was a football coach!
The implicit assumption here is that someone is hired as the football coach, and then the school administration has to find a place to stick that person for their full time job, so they stick them in a social studies classroom because (and I have seen this said!) it has either the lowest standards or is the easiest to teach.
Whew, educators, do you hear yourselves?
I am not discounting your experience of the coach at whatever school where you saw this.
What I am doing is asking that we all take a minute and note that there are thousands of educators who go to school and get themselves certified as social studies and history teachers, and they do a damn good job at a very difficult subject to teach.
And from what his former students are saying, Tim Walz was good at that job*.
Wishing him all the very best as he works to get this next one!
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| Headwaters of the Mississippi. They're in Minnesota, dontcha know. |
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*Walz attended Chadron State in Nebraska for undergrad, which started as a teacher training college, or what we used to call a normal school. Please enjoy that detail.
As a social studies/history nerd, the fact he was a social studies teacher makes him even more endearing to me! The old trope needs to go far, far away. BECAUSE he knows history, he has an even better grasp on the dangers of fascism. LFG!!!
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