by Ximena Mayoral Juarez

Entering school can be nerve racking, especially when students don’t have the support you need at home. When help is needed, most of the time a student goes to a teacher rather than a parent, showing that a strong relationship between a student and a teacher is very important, especially during the school year.

Building a strong relationship with a teacher could genuinely help a student with many challenges, like if they ever need help with their school work. Not only that, but having a trusted adult to talk to can also be helpful.

According to the non-profit organization EdTrust, “Strong relationships between adults and students must include expressing care, challenging growth, providing support, sharing power, and expanding possibilities. Importantly, these relationship-building actions must be done with an equity lens, one that supports positive racial, cultural, and ethnic identity development.”

Having a teacher who genuinely loves what they do and wants to share that passion with their students is very important, in addition to wanting their students to have a good time learning the subject.

“I like to learn. I’ve been a lifelong learner, and I think it’s really cool to be able to share my love of books and my love of history. And just my love of learning with students and pass that onto them and watch them get excited about…you know, uncovering things. That makes it worth it,” said English teacher Evan Myers.

Having to learn a new subject is hard enough, but also having a teacher to make lessons fun is always a positive. We can see how much they put their heart into it and want kids to have a good time while learning. 

According to Jason Learning, a nonprofit education program focused on science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM), “Teachers have the unique ability to make students fall in love with subject areas they otherwise may have been intimidated by. Educators can make their students feel like a ‘math person’ or a ‘science person’ by teaching and adapting content in a way that works for students rather than against them.” 

Being able to enjoy the class helps a student, especially when that student has fallen in love with the subject that their teacher has taught. 

Sophomore Alyssa Anderson said English teacher Holden Henderson provided this kind of inspiration.

“Mr. Henderson impacted my life by, 1. Giving me a new obsession with mythology. Especially ‘Epic the Musical’ and ‘The Odyssey’ and making me happy. I always used to look forward to going to his class; his class was my favorite,” she said. “My favorite subject he taught was mythology and ‘Romeo and Juliet.’ Not only did I learn something out of those things, but I also got a few laughs in when I did.”

Sure, a teacher could just teach and grade papers, but a good teacher would not only just teach and move on, but would want to be more involved with their students outside of the classroom.

Math teacher Scott Lowe said his mission, which he includes in his syllabus, “is to build trusting relationships with all students. And it doesn’t mean just in the classroom, just in general. Our main goal is to be professional and to teach our subject. I (also) believe as teachers we should be trying to build relationships with these kids.”

Knowing teachers want to make a safe instructional environment and build relationships with their students is something we really don’t focus on enough. Often we just stress about school and don’t realize that our teachers do want to make an impact in their students’ lives, even if it’s just a small one 

As Myers said, “Every single year when seniors graduate, I’m always crying at least once per season because I’m like, ‘I know I’ll never get to see them again.’ Yeah, I think as a teacher and a coach I get to make an impact, at least a little one.”