Christa McAuliffe was one...

Image:Christa's Portrait, Challenger crew
Info: Christa's bio, Teacher in Space program

It's all well and good to talk about how important teachers are and how they are terribly underpaid for the work they do, but I have seen little done to remedy the situation in my lifetime. In fact, during that same time period I have seen the media (just feeding America's appetite) elevate athletes, rock stars and movie actors to near god-like status, and yet still nothing has been done for our educators.
We have high school basketball and football games covered 365 days-a-year; everything from pre-season games, to next year's varsity picks are required reading in every local paper--check yours right now, you'll see. A school near me recently approved spending $1 million to replace it's grass football field with astro-turf. Yet science, math and music programs are underfunded in almost every school district. When was the last time you cheered on the Debate Team?
Our priorities are misplaced, and will continue to be so until we force ourselves to recognize true role-models, real achievments and actual heroes.
Until then, read articles like this one and pass them along to everyone you know.