Greece Teacher's Day

In Greece, the teacher has the following additional duties: answering the phones, filling out every bureaucratic form required by superiors, supervising students at recess, opening the school door for visitors to enter, making minor repairs. All this because there is no secretariat in the schools. Given that all teachers teach (even the principal) there is not one person to answer the phone. It's answered by a random person who just happens to be passing by. Of course there is no janitor to supervise the students at recess, open the door and make minor repairs like changing a broken lock.

Every year, on 30 January, the Christian Church commemorates together the three Great Fathers and ecumenical teachers, Basil the Great, Gregory the Theologian and John Chrysostom. In Greece, the Three Hierarchs are honoured as patrons of education and letters.

The feast of the Three Hierarchs was introduced into the Church in the mid-11th century by the scholar and metropolitan of Euchaea, John Mauropoda (1000-1070), during the reign of Emperor Constantine IX Monomachos (1000-1055). The feast of the Three Hierarchs, apart from its ecclesiastical character, also has an educational character in our country.

The educational character of the feast of the Three Hierarchs was established on 9 August 1841 by the academic council of the Othonian University (now the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens) and was first celebrated on 30 January 1842.