I recently finished Ina Garten’s book, Be Ready When the Luck Happens. In her memoir, Garten tells the story of talking with Emily Blunt on her cooking show Be My Guest with Ina Garten. Emily Blunt shared that she had a terrible stutter as a young person, but one of her teachers noticed that she didn’t stutter at all when she talked in different accents while goofing around with her friends. That teacher encouraged Blunt to audition for the school play. Not only has she been acting ever since, but acting also aided Blunt in ridding herself of her stutter.
Some stories hit me at just the right time. I couldn’t help but tear up as I thought about the teacher of young Emily Blunt. This teacher had a conversation based on a profoundly ordinary occurrence in the daily life of a teacher: noticing. Emily Blunt’s teacher noticed and encouraged her. Nothing more. And yet, it mattered.
Teachers matter. In fact, a study published by the RAND Corporation found that “Teachers matter more to student achievement than any other aspect of schooling.” Harvard University’s Center for Education Policy Research website asserts that “Research consistently shows that teaching is the single most important school-based factor in a student’s academic growth.”
Teachers matter. A study from John Hopkins University found that when a Black student has one Black teacher before they enter third grade, that student is 13% more likely to go to college. When Black students have two Black teachers, the percentage almost triples to 32%. Black boys from low-income households who have at least one Black teacher are 40% more likely to graduate on time from high school. The study asserts that Black teachers have this impact because they 1) serve as role models to their students and 2) are optimistic about their students’ futures and therefore hold them to high expectations.
Teachers believing that they matter, matters. In our last podcast, Gina Benz referenced the meta analysis conducted by John Hattie’s team on Collective Teacher Efficacy (CTE), which synthesizes years of research on teacher efficacy. In short, CTE data says that when teachers believe they matter and they look at data that shows they are making an impact, students' achievement will outperform any other contributing factors (like socioeconomic status).
2023 National Teacher of the Year and University of South Dakota graduate, Rebecka Peterson, shared a practice that she does to help herself remember that teaching matters. She keeps every note, every drawing, every scrap, in a box. On the days where she wonders if teaching matters, she pulls out the box and reminds herself that she has her own stories of students like Emily Blunt. All good teachers do.
When I heard the story of Emily Blunt, I thought of the countless untold stories of teachers who noticed and mattered in the lives of their students. If you are a student or a former student and you have a story of a time in which a teacher mattered to you: tell that teacher. It matters.
Want to think about more ways that teachers matter? Teachers of Tomorrow recently posted a blog, 12 Reasons Why Teachers Matter with a comprehensive list.
The views and opinions expressed on SDPB’s Teacher Talk are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of South Dakota.
