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As with any profession there is a body of knowledge and a range of skills that must be acquired before teachers can be regarded as competent. However, the satisfaction gained from competency in a complex profession is not the reason why most teachers continue to attend their place of work each day. For many, a main motivation is a commitment to the children they teach. For a significant number their faith in Christ is also part of their motivation. For the Christian teacher, teaching is part of discipleship and a response to Christ's command to follow him. A survey conducted a few years ago on the background of teachers indicates that there was then a higher proportion of Christians in teaching than could be expected from the number of Christians in the population as a whole (Francis, 1987b).
Nothing involving the motivation of people to undertake a task is ever straightforward. Visiting a school towards the end of a term and listening to the conversation in the staffroom may create the impression that teachers are tired, cynical and only too eager to escape from the profession. This human response to a difficult environment should not blind church people to the real level of commitment within the profession and the significant number of teachers for whom teaching is still a vocation. Some teachers will have entered their profession with this sense of vocation already developed. Others develop such a vocation through the work that they do.
The churches need to find ways of developing, encouraging and affirming the vocation to teach in the schools in their locality, not only among young people but also among those who have maturity and experience of the world to offer, alongside other gifts to the children that they will teach.
More about vocation from the Teachers section of this web site.
How
do Christians become teachers?
Nurturing teachers
How do Christians who are teachers become Christian
teachers?
Helping Christian teachers grow in their faith and their
profession
The headteacher - a special case?
Support staff
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