Who Are Educators?

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Who Are Educators?

It seems like a simple enough question, and looking at the Merriam-Webster Dictionary gives a simple enough answer: Educator (n) 1: one skilled in teaching; teacher. 2a: a student of the theory and practice of education; educationist.

That said, there are nuances that have to be considered. A 2016 Education Week article poses that an educator is a person who is “one skilled in teaching: teacher.” From that perspective, we have to consider who the Educators are in the name of our organization, Youth and Educators Succeeding.

In our case, youth and adults are educators. That’s right: youth themselves are often educators! Trained in presentation skills and adept at technology usage and integration, the Student Tech Leaders in our flagship GenYES program are skilled at what they do in ways few young people are. In our Freechild Institute program, participants learn that young people teach about a plethora of issues beyond technology, too; in our SoundOut program, we discover students have been teaching in schools for dozens of years.

Think About It: Students as Educators

What responsibilities do you hand over to students?

When can teachers foster students taking responsibility for educating others?
Do you see that approaches to students as educators can have wide-spread applications across the curriculum?
In heterogeneous groups, can students who aren’t from the same group be effective teachers?
What are some of the different modalities students can educate through that aren’t typical in schools?

Who are educators? Share your thoughts in the comments below!