The author writes, So I do not believe in “The Great
Teacher.” I subscribe to the words of my former vice-
principal, Larry Breen, who said, “I believe in the right
teacher at the right time, at the right place. Because if you
took our faculty from this wealthy neighborhood, which
supposedly has a lot of great teachers in it, and you dropped
them in the poor neighborhood twenty minutes away, you’d find
that a lot of the ‘great teachers’ are not great
teachers.”

I believe this to be true but only to a certain extent.

It takes a special kind of individual to answer the teaching
call in a poor neighborhood. Just about anybody will find
success working with upper-middle class kids, but it takes a
true teacher to work with kids in poverty.

Before I am accused of painting with a broad brush, allow me
to say that children from middle class and upper middle class
backgrounds TEND to come to school ready to learn and have
had a plethora of language and literacy experiences that will
make learning easier than for their poverty-stricken, ELL
counterparts. These kids have the motivation and support to
do well in school. Getting them to achieve GREAT success,
however, will require a better teacher - no doubt about that.

Teachers who do not work with kids in poverty squirm when I
say these things because the work they do is still valuable,
still important, and extremely relevant. ALL children deserve
an outstanding education. The fact that they do this with
kids who don't come to school under-dressed, under-bathed,
under-fed, and with 'street smarts' that make the middle
class stomach churn, does not devalue their teaching life.

The teacher featured in this article is revered and
legendary. His teaching style worked well with several
generations of students in this wealthy neighborhood. But the
principal makes an astute observation, although not directly
in reference to the "great" teacher featured in this article.
Had Mr. Barlow taken his style and flair to a school in
perpetual lockdown, would he have succeeded? The answer lies
in whatever it is that makes a teacher "great."

:-)K

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