Former US president Abraham Lincoln once wrote a letter to his son's teacher — not as a statesman, but as a concerned parent. In the letter written in 1830 well before he became the president, Lincoln expressed what he wished his child to learn, not merely as a student of books, but as a student of life. Let me share some lines from that letter which illustrate the true responsibilities entrusted to a teacher.

"Teach him to close his ears to a howling mob and stand and fight if he thinks he is right," wrote Lincoln, in his famous letter to a teacher. "Teach him that it is far more honorable to fail than to cheat. Teach him to have faith in his own ideas, even if everyone tells him he is wrong. Teach him to listen to all men, but teach him also to filter all he hears on a screen of truth, and take only the good that comes through."

The former president concluded with a plea to the teacher: "This is a big order, but see what you can do."

The role of a teacher, if understood in its true sense, is........

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