While I give the government educational bureaucracy and union leaders a lot of crap, I have the highest respect for the teachers down in the trenches. The ones I have worked with in the past years have all been damn good. Don't know where all the education money is ending up, but I know a lot of teachers who spend their own cash to make sure the kids have supplies and other things, so it doesn't seem to be filtering down to that level very well.

I have heard countless stories from successful people who have one or two teachers who made a big impression, sometimes with the teachers never knowing that they did so. Other than parents, teachers seem to be the largest influence on growing minds, and often not because of the subject matter they teach, but because of the examples they set and the life lessons they impart.

If you are a teacher, and you touch even just one or two students this way, you are still, IMO, looking at a job well done.