For the very first time, the North Carolina General Assembly will consider giving the public meaningful access to personnel records that have long been hidden. 

The start of this school year has been a topic fraught with debate about student needs, logistical hurdles and funding shortfalls. But, the voices and opinions of teachers seem to have been left out of the conversation when communities and schools need them most. 

When teachers were starting their careers in North Carolina some 30 years ago, they did so with the understanding that their health care would be covered and the money they put into their retirement fund would cover the cost of living when the time came. 

Something Dawn Gilchrist’s father-in-law, a retired Methodist minister, once said has stuck with her throughout her career as an educator — follow the gleam, mind the bend and enter the open door.

Leaving Watami Sushi & Noodles on Main Street in Waynesville, I smiled at the hostess, a girl named Hannah. She responded with an expression of recognition and we chatted. Hannah is a senior at Haywood Early College (HEC). I’d met her the previous week when I taught a session on blogging. Though we’d only been together a short time, we remembered each other. 

Summer is ending and schools are opening. It’s the time year when I remember the teachers.

These days, teachers are too often scapegoats for the shortcomings of parents, politicians and society at large. Truth be told, what they do each day in the classroom changes lives and changes the world. 

My fifth-grade teacher, Mrs. Pattyrae Busic, used to say, “Why, Chris, you’ve got your teeth in your mouth and your mind in Arkansas.”

I didn’t know exactly what that meant then and I still don’t. Where else would my teeth be, and why should I be thinking about Arkansas, a place I’d never been and had no interest in visiting?

The thing I miss about teaching is human connection, being part of something bigger than myself. 

When I was in the classroom, I bemoaned the exhaustive red tape that is public education. It’s an antiquated system when it comes to encouraging teachers to do better, be better. 

When we are in school, we consider ourselves fortunate when we find ourselves in the company of inspiring teachers. We value them at the time, and if they are very good, then they stay with us for the rest of our lives. We may not remember much of what they taught us, but their example can serve to inspire us, to guide us in our lives. We connect with them in the classroom, and that connection, brought about by some magic we can never quite figure out, remains long after we have left behind the world of textbooks and exams.

When the Jackson County Commissioners met June 5 to discuss final changes to the proposed budget for 2018-19, they came away with more questions than answers when faced with more than $1 million in additional funding requests. But a 10-minute follow-up June 11 was all that commissioners needed to give the OK to the plan county staff developed to address the crunch.