Philippine E-Journals

The Role of the Faculty

Gabriel H. Connon

Discipline: Education

 

Abstract:

No one will deny that the primary function of the teacher is to instruct. The teacher appears before the class essentially as a communicator; there is a given quantum of information to impart, techniques of learning to share, and habits of discipline to instill and encourage. This has always been the primary and traditional function of teaching.

 

But with modern life developing as we are presently witnessing it, there is a growing complexity, mobility and impersonality to it all, so that youth today find life acutely fragmented. A new challenge accordingly is thrust upon the teachers of our college youth: that of making the teacher's very presence among young people not only serve as a living example of one's personality, as a mature and stable human being but also as proof of the teacher's academic or scholastic competence. Perhaps it is a truism that with respect, youth invariably will assume the attitudes and opinions of their teachers, notwithstanding the many problems on the campus. Respect then is the key to the critical matter of effective student relations which frequently extends to various areas: social functions, vocational counseling, religious notions and questions, political persuasions, or even physical well-being. After all, no teacher can merely be a source of information. He must become a guide in the development of attitudes and ways of thinking, in the formation of character and personality, and even in the matter of personal style and behavior.