It is fair to say that this has been a very tough couple of years in our schools. I was raised in a family of educators and saw first-hand how difficult the business can be. My father was often extraordinarily satisfied with his work, but also often frustrated by the bureaucracy and politics. Sometimes he had students who had a seemingly insatiable thirst for knowledge… and sometimes he had students who really did not want to learn anything at all. I think that for my dad the most frustrating part of his job was when those around him thought they could do it better without having any idea at all what it actually took to be a good teacher. Seems like we all think we know better when it comes to education. Perhaps that is because we all had teachers … but having a teacher is NOT the same thing as being a teacher.

Of course, my dad passed away a good many years ago and never had to perform his magic during a pandemic. Of one thing I am certain: he would be amazed at the resilience of our community school heroes during the past two years. Under extraordinary circumstances they have risen to the occasion, and it is high time that we express our heartfelt thanks!

This was the topic of one of my staff meetings about a month ago. It came about because several of my colleagues were hearing and seeing about morale in the schools being low. As a group, we talked about the many things going on, much of which is way out of our control or even influence. We have little influence over student behavior. We have little influence over the status of contract negotiations. And we certainly do not have the ability to affect what happens at contentious meetings. However, what we do have the ability to do is to come forward and spearhead a campaign of gratitude for our school heroes, so that is what we are doing!

We have already started posting messages in social media and have developed a gratitude logo which we are sharing around under the hashtag #UnitedwithSchoolHeroes. We have also purchased over 2,000 thank you cards which are being personalized by community volunteers to be given to every employee in the Nashua School District. We were fortunate to receive an incredible donation of 8,000 Lindt Chocolate Truffles, which will be distributed with the thank you cards, along with a gratitude button we have designed. In the spring we will be launching a yard sign campaign to express community gratitude to our school heroes. And this coming Monday I will be presenting a community letter to thank our community educators at our Board of Education meeting.

It is important for you to understand that when we talk about our “school heroes” we are not only talking about teachers. We are also talking about food service workers, school guidance counselors, custodians and maintenance personnel, school nurses, para educators, school secretaries, social workers, ELL teachers, administrators, and any other school support staff. They have all done incredible work throughout the pandemic. They have kept our students engaged, learning, socially supported, connected, fed, and healthy under the most difficult of circumstances. This has included school closures, remote learning, hybrid approaches, social distancing, COVID cluster outbreaks, and so forth. They have gone to work, many times risking their own health and the health of their families and loved ones. And all too often, the thanks that they have received has been negative and often anonymous sniping in social media or at Board Meetings. While this has been tough on all of us, in my opinion our school heroes deserve nothing but our respect and immense gratitude.

So, you can help! You can post a comment on Facebook about how your child was helped by a special gesture of support. You can help write a card thanking a school hero. You can join us in distributing some love. And you can put up a yard sign in the spring. Most of all, just say something nice the next time you get a chance to. These small gestures can make all the difference and mend all the hurts, because GREAT THINGS HAPPEN WHEN WE LIVE UNITED.

Mike Apfelberg is president of United Way of Greater Nashua.