In his initial post, Reid said that he thinks that teachers should get paid more, with that in mind, Bored Panda reached out to him with some questions regarding that and more!
"There's a perception that teachers are paid appropriately for the hours they work. I'm paid fine for my own job, but at the end of the day that's to make profit for the company and supply a service to customers. It's not going to change the world.
Teachers are the people our children spend half of their waking hours with. They help to create the people those children are going to become. There are countless stories of people who credit inspirational teachers for their own success. I really think we need to pay teachers enough so the profession can attract and keep the best of the best and not lose them to better paying jobs. People may complain that by paying ALL teachers more, you end up rewarding the bad ones too. I think if the pool of good teachers is large enough, there won't be enough room for those who aren't a good fit for the role."
Reid mentioned that his son's teacher wanted to remain anonymous but he did share a few details about the amazing woman who made the plushies for the children. "The toys were made by my son’s primary school teacher in a North Melbourne suburb. She’s done this for a few years now and during Covid lockdowns even rode around the neighborhood dropping them off at the children’s houses!
The children are all in love with the results and the parents (and it seems most of the world) are too." He told Bored Panda.
Parker has also set up a GoFundMe (click here to donate), so we wanted to find out a little bit more about it and the situation that led to it.
"The GoFundMe was set up in response to the number of people who were asking how they could contribute in some way. I wasn’t going to do it at all, but saw a few comments suggesting they’d seen others trying to capitalize on this story. It felt wrong that someone could set up a fake fund to try and make money from people, so I set this up myself.
Everything will go directly to the teacher to use or redistribute as she sees fit. Hopefully, it will be enough to pay for materials or upgrade her sewing machine."
As you might have noticed, Parker is not directly involved in the making of these toys, so we were actually curious to know how he found out about the story himself.
"We heard that it's something the teacher had done in previous years, but it wasn't something we expected this time. Apparently, during the lockdown, she would walk around the neighborhood and drop off toys at each child's house!
My son told me he was asked to draw a monster that she would turn into a toy, but I didn't expect the accuracy of what he brought home at the end of the school year. I took a picture of his toy next to the drawing he had done. When I posted in a group chat with other parents in their class, they responded with their own toys and drawings. I was fascinated by how amazing they all looked, so I asked the parents if I could get them involved in a larger online post. I had a feeling other people would appreciate them too, but I didn't expect that post to reach the audience it did. I think people love a good story and the overwhelmingly positive response illustrated that."
Reid also mentioned that the children loved the gifts they received from their teacher too. "Kids love it. We went home to New Zealand to visit family for Christmas and the as-yet-unnamed toy came with us.
Apparently, it's a therizinosaurus, which he recently saw in Jurassic Park Dominion." He shared.
Lastly, we asked Reid if he perhaps knew what made his son's teacher so dedicated to making these toys a reality for the children.
"I'm not sure where she got the idea, but there are 22 kids in her class and they all have one. I saw comments on the thread from other people making toys saying it would take hundreds of hours. I don't know if that was hyperbole, but knowing how long it would take me, it seems about right!"
