Happy 2019!
I tend to have a lot of educator characters (main and minor) in my slice-of-life comics and I wondered about that.
And then it occurred to me: While reading "Archie", I was often curious about teacher, Miss Grundy, and the school principal, Mr. Weatherbee.
What did they do after school? Did they like each other? What kind of families did they have or come from? What were their hobbies?
As the child of a schoolteacher, I knew that teachers didn't live at the school but had homes like everybody else. Also, why were story teachers always old?
These sorts of questions drove me crazy as a kid. I also had to stop a lot of stupid rumors among my fellow elementary school classmates.
No, teachers didn't live at the school. They didn't sleep under their desks.
No, teachers had families and kids.
They do have spouses.
And teachers had nothing to do with the cafeteria food menu.
That's why they often bring their own lunches.
And no, teachers didn't give out homework to torment us.
Oftentimes, they had to answer to a higher authority, such as the school administrators and school boards.
Why did I only see a scratching of the surface on these musings when I watched those Hollywood films about a teacher going into a ghetto neighborhood to 'save the children'? What about the teachers who already lived there? Didn't they have a say?
Family, friends, family friends, I was always surrounded by teachers. Why not tell the stories I overheard? Why not come up with my own?
Teachers have a life, let's all acknowledge that, shall we?
