5.1 Commitment to the Teaching Profession
The concept of professional ethics may be described in the words of Laurie as, "If a teacher has not an ideal aim he had better to take to shop keeping at once, he will their doubtless find an ideal within his capacity".
The teacher should feel the importance of his profession. He would be showing a dishonesty of purpose if once having entered it he is engaged in other pursuits. Without an exclusive attention to his job he would fail in bringing forth a fine harvest of young men and women who are able to contribute their best for the welfare of mankind. If a teacher takes to his work just to make his living because nothing else is available, he will lack the essential zeal required by the teaching profession. He must be a teacher first and the teacher last.
The professional ethics demands that a teacher does not try to exploit school influence for private gains. He realizes that if he does it, he signs his moral death-warrant. The result is that no amount of pressure can wean him from the path of duty and justice. Authority cannot coerce him, nor can temptation reduce him into any course of conduct, not conducive to the highest interests of the school.
He fights all temptations to pad his purse with money to which he is not entitled. He does not indulge in tuitions. He does not prescribe or recommend books on some consideration.