Each May, communities around the country take time to let teachers and school staff know just how much they are appreciated for all they do. Through pictures, gift cards, notes, sweets, students of all ages, along with their families, offer kind gestures of appreciation to those working in our schools. 

This year, Teacher Appreciation Week comes with strict social-distancing guidelines. Guests are not allowed on campus. Masks are worn all the time. Food can only be distributed if it is in a pre-packaged wrapper. Hugs are off-limits. 

So, how do we say thank you? 

How do we say thank you to our teachers who taught at least three different versions of every class all year long?  

How do we say thank you for reinventing every class’s curriculum during summer vacation to deliver exceptional virtual and cohort-based experiences? 

How do we thank our staff who showed up, masked and distant, every day since last July, reimagining their entire department’s goals and workflows?  

How do we thank our employees who found ways to foster community and preserve social and emotional health, creatively and virtually connecting with our students despite social distancing?  

How do we thank our coaches for advocating for maintaining athletics all year long for the mental wellness of our students?  

How do we thank those that have kept our community safe and healthy, revamping daily procedures and implementing COVID protocols—advanced cleaning, new dining routines, building upfits, and campus maintenance–all while keeping campus beautiful and at the ready for learning? 

How do we appreciate our employees who put CA and its students first, even when living with at-risk family members?  

How do we appreciate our entire community for supporting our students and each other through a year of heightened fear, racism, bigotry, political strife, and repeated trauma in our broader world? 

How do we value our employees, all 152 of them, who pledged their support to CA with a gift to the CA Fund this year? 

Above all, how do we say thank you for helping us come through this trying year together, united, and perhaps even stronger?  

Well, quite simply: by doing just that. Saying thank you.  

Our employees have reinvented many wheels this year. Through screens, outdoor gatherings (even in the cold and the rain), and the occasional elbow bumps, they have connected meaningfully with students and with each other. Together, they have delivered a CA experience that, while appearing quite different, was nonetheless exceptional and true to our mission. And they have done it all because of their love for this community. For their belief in our mission. For our students and their families. 

What they–what we– miss most and need most, is to see you and hear you. Our families offer meaning behind the screens and the masks. You and your students make this meaningful work worth it.  

You may have seen emails from the Development Office this week. Laura Schoedler, our new CA Fund Director, joined us in March and is spearheading these appreciative efforts. We humbly ask that you join us. Help us present our employees with a show of community support next week. 

During this Teacher Appreciation Week, I encourage you to take a moment to share a message of thanks (you can submit them here). We will compile messages received this week—please get them to us no later than noon on Friday (tomorrow!)—into a video that will be shared with our employees next week. We hope you will add your voice and let our employees know how much you care and how much you have appreciated their efforts this year. At the end of the day, your voice and your message are the greatest appreciation of all. 

We had just come off trail in Pisgah National Forest, and it was pouring rain. Our group had spread out over a three-mile uphill scramble. As we waited for the rest of the hikers to finish, we huddled in a vehicle out of the deluge. Before long, two students invited me into their conversation.

“Dr. Ehrhardt, what do you like best about Cary Academy?”

I spend a lot of time talking with people about this school, so this question should be easy. We have a special mission, and we pursue it with zeal. We’ve been working on many important initiatives as part of a well-thought-out strategic plan. We are the very embodiment of an innovative learning organization.

Yet, somehow, none of that sounded right.

“What do you like?” I volleyed.

“Oh, that’s easy,” one of the students said, without skipping a beat. “I like how the teachers here care about me.”

Yes! Cue the forehead slap.

Not only is this a nice sentiment and a huge compliment to our teachers, but the beauty here is how deftly this young woman was able to capture the essence of good teaching.

In an important study called The Nature of Learning: Using Research to Inspire Practice, the OECD synthesized the literature surrounding effective learning environments into seven frames. Listing just the top four, we see that great teachers

• put learners at the center and encourage engagement so that learners come to understand themselves as learners;
• see learning as social and collaborative;
• understand that emotions are integral to learning and that learners’ motivations matter; and
• recognize individual differences.

I’d put “care” at the core, too.

The close of Teacher Appreciation Week is a natural time for a shout-out to the teachers who have impacted our lives. Whether I’m talking to students, parents, or alumni, I am continually blown away with their impact.

Some are immediate—that time a teacher sees a student struggling and intervenes or calls out an extra special effort on an assignment. Some impacts build over the course of a year, often leading to that breakthrough or “ah-ha” moment of deepened understanding or skill. Our college counselors are perhaps in the best position to see our teachers’ impact come application time, as students report a major or career interest sparked by a particular teacher or class.

Still other impacts take much longer to materialize. Take the alumni parent who told me that her daughter absolutely “didn’t appreciate” (oh, so diplomatic) a certain Upper School teacher, but just put all the skills she learned in that class to important use in a capstone college course. Or the alumni who spoke recently about channeling a certain Middle School teacher’s “way of being” in his current work as a psychologist.

Teachers: Here is to the decisions, big and small, that go into each school year, trimester, unit of study, school day, individual lesson, or personal interaction. Teaching is exhausting work, even though we too often pretend it should feel effortless—a natural part of your “calling” to work with young people.

Phooey.

Among many things, at any given moment, you could be called upon to serve as expert, coach, counselor, mediator, mindreader, or judge. This work is anything but effortless. Nonetheless, we expect you to bring goodwill, passion, joy, and heady optimism into the classroom every day—despite what may be happening at home or in the world around you.

And you do!

Because you are a professional.

Because you are good at what you do.

Because you care.

And for that, we offer our deepest thanks.