In October 2025, the teachers of Alberta went on strike, putting students out of school for over a month. But its impact seems to be lost on students just a couple months after. I feel grateful to be back in school, especially since I graduate this year, but I want to take some time to highlight a few teachers who have made an immense impact on my life in hopes of reminding our readers of the thanks we owe them.

Working Overtime

Forget reading multiple essays. Reading my own essay takes multiple attempts, and I am not meant to assess it. Teaching is more than the typical corporate 9-5 job because 9-5 mostly consists of instructional and prep time. Especially with colossal class sizes, marking must be time-consuming. My teachers tell me they need to fit in their overtime in the little space they have around family commitments and personal events.

It’s easy to complain about getting assignments and exams marked late, but it’s also important to carry empathy for our teachers who work so hard for so many students. Overtime is essential to finishing their work; I think it’s unfair to complain about their both their efforts and the fact that overtime is essential in the first place.

Extracurricular Responsibilities

High school students tend to expect a lot from school activities. Every student activity cannot represent the school unless there is a teacher sponsor present, and oftentimes they aren’t paid for this. Our teachers volunteer to help us pursue our passions and ambitions for post-secondary, but while we only do it for a couple years before moving on they volunteer to run clubs and athletics for years. When hiring teachers, their willingness to take on newer formed clubs carries weight as well.

It’s a lot of responsibility and additional work, and I want to take a moment to thank every teacher for their dedication to student success and career exploration. You truly make such a major difference in our lives and we are very grateful for it.

Letters of Recommendation and References

If you’re looking for post-secondary options, universities and companies often do not trust students to give accurate accounts of their own work and look toward “academic references” instead. Job applications require references from previous employers, but since most of us are going for our first part-time jobs, we don’t have real work experience and look toward our teachers for help.

Teachers speak to your character, work ethic, personality, and capabilities. They pour time and effort, both of which are much depleted from other parts of their job, and genuinely want success for you which is why they ask for so much time in advance.

Be sure to take some time to send thank-you gifts, or at least thank-you cards, to some of the teachers who have helped you out!

Tolerating Students

Both myself and my peers are far from perfect students. When we get bored, we can be noisy. When we are tired, we are unfocused. We can be chatty and a bit disruptive. We are human, but we’re still developing humans without mature frontal lobes.

Our teachers have to tolerate our silly behaviors and our emotional ups and downs when they teach. It’s not easy, especially when they get little to no engagement or thanks for it.

I’m sure you’ve sat in a class where the teacher asks a question and the response is dead silence. Crickets. You could probably hear a pin drop. And it’s not that people don’t know the answer, but rather that they don’t want to ask questions or that they can’t be bothered to engage.

But we’ve all given presentations to a deadbeat audience before, and it isn’t easy. It’s hard enough to fear your peers for a brief 5 minutes standing up by the SMART Board, so could you imagine presenting to students who are often choose to act exhausted and jaded every day?

What You Can Do To Support Your Teachers

Your teachers want to see you succeed. Nothing bad can come of small actions that help support those who believe in you! Here are a few examples:

• Sign petitions for teachers rights
• Be politically active – email your government/district representative
• Show some more gratitude
• Hold back your complaints
• Come to class with an open mind and your best efforts
• at the very minimum: engage with your teachers and participate in class!