The Compassion of a Teacher

It was funny when I read the question: "When did the compassion of a teacher make a difference in your life or in the life of your classmate?", because I have an experience that covers both.

When I was in high school, a new kid moved to town about mid-year and joined the high school band, where he played trombone. I paid little attention to the new kid as I had been in the high school band for several years and already had an established friend group.

Band class continued as it always did and nothing seem out of the ordinary, until one day when my band director ask several of my friends, including myself, to talk with him in his office. Now, I had never considered my band director to be a person that had any compassion towards any of his students, but I was quickly corrected. As soon as my friends and I were in his office and the door was closed, my band director began to explain how the new trombone player did not have any friends and would eat his lunch alone in the band room. He did not ask us to become friends with the new kid, but did ask us to leave his office as if everything was normal, get our lunches, decide for a change of pace that we would eat in the band room, and include the lone trombone player in our conversations.

The covert plan proved successful. Though we did not ever become good friends with the lone trombone player, we did bring him out of his shell, convince him that he should come eat with us in the lounge (with everyone else), and introduced him to several of his, now, good friends. Though my band director's compassion did not directly affect me, it certainly did the lone trombone player, and I learned that showing a little concern for a student's well-being can have a large impact on their lives.