This is not the first time that Cuba has gone through hard times. There are many examples of its strength and resistance. This is not the reason for closing classrooms. The country and its teachers have made it possible to continue.
December saw, more than 60 years ago, how an entire island was able to learn about letters in order to build the future. The greatest cultural event undertaken by the Cuban Revolution was the Literacy Campaign, which began the path to sweep away the ignorance of a people and put in their hands the light of books.
The achievement was carried out by teachers and many others who, without being teachers, became teachers. That unparalleled feat made it possible for Cuba to be declared an illiteracy-free territory on December 22, 1961. The date later inspired Cuban educators to be honored on that day.
Teaching is not the same as being a teacher. It is not enough to be part of a teaching staff or to have a school as a work center. Being a teacher is not just a job.
Whoever considers himself a teacher must know that there is no mirror like himself in which a child can look; that his own conduct is beyond reproach; that favoritism and injustice are inadmissible; that the classroom is a place of peace and ethics.
The true teacher will be a confidant, will be attentive to the distracted face; will know, just by looking at his students, what is going on; will be trustworthy and purposeful.
The teacher, if he is a true teacher, will understand that he must take care of his appearance and attitude; that there are new souls taking refuge in him; that the budding character fits his forms; that the love offered will multiply.
He will defend the Homeland, from a poem, a real fact, or from the accuracy of the sciences; he who disdains it, has never been it. The classroom is the temple where there is no room for the unworthy. When by law of life the teacher is not there, let no one believe that he has left. Let us look for him in the professional success of his students, in the souls where he nested his mark, in the greatness of others in which he flourished, without making noise.
