When did teachers become the enemy?

Note: The following column was published in Politics NC.

While we were told to wait for all the information to make a judgment about police actions in Uvalde, the police themselves were quick to share a (now disproven) story that the shooter gained access through a door propped open by a teacher. This attempt to blame a teacher for the public safety failures in Uvalde got a shocking amount of traction in the days that followed for something that was apparently wholesale fabricated. 

Whether it was covid or recent mass shootings, teachers have become the scapegoat for displaced anger. It ties to a long and ongoing narrative effort to undermine teachers and thereby public education. Just a few years ago, despite decades of effort from the right-wing to portray teachers as “union thugs” or worse, teachers continued to be one of the most trusted if undervalued public figures in American life. Across all demographics and ideologies people trusted teachers even when they were not happy with schools – now, like so much else there is a huge ideological divide in trust for teachers.

The pandemic and the frustration borne of it, created an opening that this long standing narrative from the right-wing to undercut teachers was only happy to fill. As teachers did what they always do – made the best with the resources available to them, they became the face of pandemic responses they too were adapting to as best they could.