As fall rolls in, kids everywhere are back to their routines. They are back to school. Do the words “back to school” bring back any poignant memories for you from your childhood? In our recollections of so many years ago, the feelings associated with going back to school were mixed, but we can readily tally the good and the bad. On the negative side of the ledger we could list the loss of freedom as summer ended, the resumption of homework, and the heavy obligation to be responsible and productive for months on end. But there was plenty to list on the positive side of the ledger, too. When school recommenced in the fall we could look forward to new clothes and new school shoes, a fresh box of crayons, reconnecting with friends, and best of all, that vague but exciting premonition that new and intriguing ideas were going to be revealed to us.
Across the years, as our education rolled on, the anticipation that came with going back to school never subsided. School granted us windows into worlds unknown, the acquisition of exciting information, and the slow but steady shifting of the line that marked the limits of our understanding. All in all, the balance sheet associated with going back to school was heavily tilted toward the positive. Learning things was an essentially good experience.
But what we didn’t really appreciate until decades after our formal schooling had ended, was that it was not just the raw data stuffed into our vacant but receptive brains that ultimately made school so valuable. In retrospect, one of the most significant aspects of our education related not to the curriculum at all, but to the teachers.
If you are anything like us, you can probably name several truly formative teachers. Did they manage to make geometry comprehensible or history memorable or French pronounceable? Maybe. But chances are, they were formative because they gave you more than an appreciation for the material they taught. Chances are they gave you something significant of themselves.
We remember the teachers whose enthusiasm and inquisitiveness sparked our own. We remember those whose persistence was steadying, whose kindness was healing, whose encouragement was essential to us. One modeled patience, another good humor and another solid good sense. They became examples of the possibility of developing and applying these qualities to our own lives. We learned so much from these formative teachers because they had themselves been so well formed. They were people of character and they taught us more than they ever knew.
Of course the school of character extends beyond formal classrooms. We’re mindful that character formation can continue throughout life as we watch and emulate great teachers in our midst. Our parents, our friends and our colleagues can all teach us. We can even read the stories in our holy texts with the willingness to learn the lessons of character portrayed there.
Where are you going to school? Are you still learning to be more temperate, more compassionate, more generous, more faithful, more hopeful, more loving? Then you’ve found some formative teachers. And here’s a provocative thought: you just may be the most important teacher in the world for someone else. Even now, someone may be learning from observing you and absorbing what your life and your character reveals. For somebody somewhere, you may be far more important than you knew!
