Dear Teachers

Sometimes I can't believe the things you say and teach. It is your job to to teach your students important skills that they will need in life, but often you have no idea what you're talking about. I've seen incompetence in this vain in a variety of ways, from not understanding the topic, to being horrible at explaining it, to just simply not caring.

I know you're underpaid, and I know your job isn't exactly easy. The students might not always seem to appreciate what you're doing for them, but you're incredibly important for them. Your students need you to help them become a productive member of society. People sometimes complain about how kids today don't try hard enough or something and end up doing nothing with their lives. This may be true to some extent, but half the problem is how bad some teachers are.

The worst part is, that the students know exactly who the horrible teachers are, but there's nothing they can do about it. There are no teacher evaluations, at least not until college (and I don't think they really mean much of anything here either, unless the particular teacher in question actually carefully reads them and decides to try and improve based on them, but of course if you're one of those teachers than you're probably not the problem and this letter isn't for you). Many times I've been sitting in class, thinking "man, I could explain this better than you." Often I would have friends, or even people I barely knew, asking me for help because I was viewed as one of the "smart kids" and they were learning nothing from the teacher.

Seriously teachers, care about your work and understand your subject, we need you.
-SF