Educator or Teacher? Is there a difference?

Expressiveness is one of the features that make languages very fascinating; It is that ability to express a single idea in different ways and to use different words to describe the same concept that makes a language practical and empowering for us as humans.

What’s even more fascinating about language, though, is those instances where we look deeper into some of the words that we use interchangeably and realize that we actually express slightly different ideas with each one of them; ideas that are in essence the same, yet very different. The words teacher are educator are one example of this.

According to Merriam Webster, an educator is

 ” a person (such as a teacher or a school administrator) who has a job in the field   of education”

1: “one skilled in teaching: TEACHER”

2    a: “a student of the theory and practice of education”

b: “an administrator in education.”

while a teacher is

“a person or thing that teaches something; especially : a person whose job is to teach students about certain subjects”

Beside that denotative meaning that Webster provides us, the two words, teacher and educator, are connotatively used interchangeably and are pretty much synonymous to many people. However, thinking deeper into these words, many would agree that they have different meanings.

 Now telling what that difference is might be a bit of a challenge for many of us, myself included, but that is ok because 1) even if we cannot express the difference in words, we still know deep inside that it exists and that an educator is somehow more than just an ordinary teacher. and 2) Google is here (luckily:) and we can always wander through the World Wide Web to see how our fellow humans reflected on the difference between the two words.

The most interesting difference I came across when I did my Google research was that by Dr. Ashley Tan. He synthesizes the differences into powerful bullet points that provide us with a deep insight into the difference between the two:

• Everyone can teach. Few can educate.

• A teacher teaches; an educator reaches.
• A teacher typically focuses on curriculum and assessment. An educator focuses on development and evaluation.
• In the curricular race, a teacher perspires. In the journey of lifelong learning, an educator inspires. (An educator goes the extra mile.)
• A teacher works with content. An educator deals with people.
• Teaching is a job. Educating is a calling.
• Some teachers do this to earn. Educators do this to learn (about themselves, their learners, better ways to inspire, etc).
• A teacher might network locally. An educator is connected globally (and thinks and acts that way too).

Just like Dr. Ashley, the great majority of reflections and answers I found have suggested that the word educator has a sense of adding the role of a mentor to someone who teaches, making an educator someone who truly cares and leaves a permanent positive influence in the lives of those he educates, because after all, it is not Math, Grammar, or biology that students need to succeed in life, but rather the social and emotional empowerment to use their mathematical, grammatical, and biological knowledge to create success and make this world a better place.