Not So Hot for Teacher
Illustration by Tom Gauld
By ELIZABETH ALSOP
Published: September 14, 2012 Comment
In his State of the Union address in 2011, President Obama made a point of applauding the nation’s teachers and exhorted Americans to do the same. “In South Korea,” Obama reminded us, “teachers are known as ‘nation builders.’ . . . It’s time we treated the people who educate our children with the same level of respect.”
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Out in TV land, however, we’ve been receiving a different message. In the past few years, viewers saw teachers turning tricks (“Hung”), dealing drugs (“Breaking Bad”) and taunting overweight students (“The Big C”). All, of course, while not teaching. In the opening episode of “The Big C,” a student in Cathy Jamison’s summer-school course asks, “Are you going to teach us anything today?”
“Have I ever taught you anything, really?” Jamison counters, before queuing up a DVD