Apple for the teacher? No thanks, I’ll take a martini.

Posted on February 20, 2007 by megevil

I don’t understand the iconography of the apple as a representation of teaching. I have never once had a student give me an apple (wait, once a kid gave me a chocolate “apple” with a gummy worm inside), nor have I ever given a teacher an apple. I vote that we remove apple pictures/drawings from all teacher-related merchandise. I mean seriously. It’s insulting. I have to have multiple college degrees AND continue to take graduate level coursework throughout my career (which, I may add, my employer does NOT help with financially), be an expert in 800 years of literature, know everything about writing that everyone SHOULD know but most don’t, understand and apply theories of adolescent development/psychology, manage a classroom, keep detailed records on 160 kids at a time, communicate with parents, answer to (frequently clueless) administrators, develop a curriculum that is both challenging and meaningful, grade for hours a day, and do so many other things that I don’t even want to mention because I am so tired after work (ha! see?)… and what represents my profession? A damn piece of fruit! No way. That is so not right. Other professions are known by visual representations of something that actually has to do with their daily work — mine, not so much.Any ideas on what it should be instead? C’mon fellow teachers, students, former students, etc… the lawyers get blind justice holding the scales, firefighters have a helmet and an ax… what should be the NEW official mascot of teachers?

Filed under: bitching, education, humor, teaching

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One Response to “Apple for the teacher? No thanks, I’ll take a martini.”

  1. CJ, on February 20th, 2007 at 10:14 pm Said:

    I guess the argument could be raised that said apple represents the fruits of knowledge, but it doesn’t really answer the question of why teacher’s can’t get more exciting fruit, like strawberries or pomegranates. Some uncreative educational associations may embrace the apple as a symbol of education, but such a symbol doesn’t really lend it self much to education - an apple is something that grows from a small seed, yes, but it requires little tending in the process and could hardly be described as a unique creation.
    Perhaps a better representation would be a mosaic of a student, composed of the cobbled pictures of the dozen of educators who shaped and formed the end result…not that that would go well on a coffee mug.

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