As we get ready for The Great Thanksgiving Listen 2019, there is one thing we can all be thankful for: educators. Beyond the work that they do every day to teach and support children across the country, educators have brought The Great Thanksgiving Listen to classrooms for years to teach children oral history and the art of listening.

At StoryCorps, we’re also always thankful for our participants who have shared their stories with us through the StoryCorps App or at a recording location. In the archive, there are many stories from educators, talking about their experiences within the profession and their lives outside the classroom.

Take a listen to some of those stories:

Geneva McCall shares with her son John McCall her experiences attending school in the segregated south and eventually getting her master’s degree in education.

Theresa Horoschak talks to her mom Veronica Horoschak about becoming a special education teacher and growing up, including family camping trips.

Sisters Stephanie and Alexandra Frank discuss their differing areas of teaching, one being a college professor and one being an elementary school teacher.

High school teachers Takeru Nagayoshi and Esther Jeong discuss their second year of teaching and reflect on their racial identity as educators.

Ellizar Abalos tells his wife Erin Abalos about his childhood in the Philippines and his experiences as a music teacher and in the US Navy.

Serina Zazueta interviews her teacher Michael Reppenhagen and learns about his background and family in order to get to know him as a person outside of school.

Yacoub Aljaffery and his niece Hawra Alnabi describe their lives as refugees, and how those experiences inspired Yaboub to become an ESL teacher.

Rashon Luke learns more about his former classmate Matthew Smart, who is now a fourth grade teacher in Brooklyn.