Introduction to Tom Kertes
Tom Kertes is a teacher in Prince Rupert, British Columbia. He was born in Ellensburg, Washington in 1973 and he grew up in Cheney, a small farming and college town near Spokane. Tom Kertes moved to Canada with his now-husband, Ron Braun, in 2007, in opposition to torture by the United States government during its “War on Terror.” Tom worked in media, politics, and government policy Toronto and labour organizing in Vancouver. He now holds dual Canadian-American citizenship.
[Tom Kertes] had been thinking of [immigrating to] Canada since the invasion of Iraq and the US government began using “enhanced interrogation techniques” on detainees.
My Reflections on Professional Values
Public education provides education on a universal and barrier-free basis for the pursuit of knowledge. It is a pillar of liberal democracy, a society based in respect for individual human rights, democratic institutions, and the rule of law — on an equal, just, and fair basis. The foundation of public education, and of a free society, is universal literacy. Literacy is a precursor to liberty.
Education empowers students through the acquisition and production of knowledge. Through education, the student gains the capacity “to know” and it is up to the student — not the teacher or the “system” — to determine what knowledge they will attain, how they will use this knowledge, and the values and beliefs that will underpin its application. The aim of public education is for each student to learn how to use knowledge, according to the dictates of their own conscience, as a member of a pluralistic society.
Here is how I explained these ideas further when I was studying educational leadership at Vancouver Island University:
I am a teacher because I believe that human life is sacred, everyone is born worthy of unconditional respect, and human dignity is endowed, inherent, universal, infinite, and absolute. The recognition of human life as sacred is an expression of praxis, which according to Paulo Freire, is “the action and reflection of men and women upon their world in order to transform it”. Praxis — reflective action — is humanization, a means by which the sanctity of human life is animated; it is how the sanctification of human life is both made possible and how it is realized.
Praxis is also at the heart of education. Praxis, as a form of learning, connects to Lev Vygotsky‘s conception of the zone of proximal development (learning
proceeding development) by how learning, in this sense, makes humanization possible. According to Vygotsky, “properly organized learning results in mental development and sets in motion a variety of developmental processes that would be impossible apart from learning”. This makes organized learning (education) a “necessary and universal aspect of the process of developing culturally organized, specifically human, psychological functions”. Praxis (reflective action) and learning (proximal development) are at the heart of “humanizing education”.
My Professional Experience
From 2015 to 2018, I taught at Tahayghen Elementary in Masset, Sk’aadgaa Naay Elementary in Skidegate, and Gidg̱alang Ḵuuyas Naay in Daajing Giids. I moved from Daajing Giids to Prince Rupert in 2018, first teaching at the middle school for five years and now teaching high school English since 2023.
Before teaching, I worked as a communications advisor, helping produce children’s educational television and other media. I was a production coordinator for Biz Kids, a nationally syndicated Emmy Award-winning educational TV series about money and business.
I also helped produce viral videos and media campaigns viewed by tens of millions of people, which were covered by the Globe and Mail, Toronto Star, CBC News, New York Times, ABC News, Washington Post, the Guardian, and other news outlets.
My Views on a Strong Community
I am committed to helping build a strong community for everyone. That’s why I was an advocate for: clean water, public infrastructure, keeping the city’s library under local control, and reopening places of worship in the final weeks of the pandemic lockdowns. I learned about community organizing by working with the United Workers Association in Baltimore, Maryland, and as an AIDS activist in Washington DC.
I am past president of the North Coast and Haida Gwaii Labour Council, past vice president of the Prince Rupert District Teachers’ Union, and former policy advisor to Ontario’s self-regulatory College of Early Childhood Educators.
Contact Tom Kertes
Phone/Text: 778-884-5343
Email: tomkertes@gmail.com