After nine days, the West Virginia teacher strike/work stoppage is drawing to a close, with Republican legislators finally agreeing to give teachers the five percent raise that became their benchmark for returning to work (the raise will also extend to all state workers).

In my 22 years of life in West Virginia, I've seldom if ever seen a movement with this kind of unity and power. And although students may not have been in school during the protests, teachers taught plenty of lessons while standing up for themselves, other state employees, and the future of West Virginia.

Indulging my passion for social studies, the first of these was that:

1. Citizens can make a huge difference beyond the ballot

Sometimes in a democracy, we think that our power is limited solely to how we vote. Thankfully, as we've seen over the past two weeks and throughout history, that isn't true. Civil disobedience has long been a staple of social change, and when the established order of society is disrupted it becomes hard for people in power to ignore the issues plaguing citizens.

Are there risks associated even with non-violent, passive protest such as that which West Virginia teachers used?

Certainly.

But a willingness to stand firm for what is right and refuse to back down until that right is recognized often has more power than elections. It's quite possible that a five percent raise would have remained a pipe dream had West Virginia teachers simply waited for the ballot box.

Speaking of the ballot...

2. Some WV politicians don't value education much

I went down to Charleston last Saturday, as Senate Republicans proposed and adopted an amendment to lower the raise the teacher pay raise from five to four percent. I listened to live streams of the meeting of the Senate Finance Committee where the amendment was proposed, and I sat in the Senate Gallery where it was adopted on a party line vote. It quickly became apparent to me that many Senate Republicans do not care much for educators.

Without naming names (the videos are accessible here), one Republican Senator said teachers should be content because he had spoken with people who made $20,000 a year that were pleased to receive $500 raises – "They didn't complain," the Senator said, "they just said thank you." Another Republican Senator practically began yelling at his colleagues in the middle of the committee meeting for supporting the raise. And on the floor, one Republican stated that were they to pass the amended bill lowering the raise to four percent, citizens of West Virginia would say "we did what we could... teachers in my district will say 'you guys did pretty well.'"

It was hard for teachers in the gallery to stifle their laughter and/or outrage at that last comment, perhaps because West Virginia pays its teachers lower than most states in the country. Even five percent is only a stepping stone to fixing that problem and making the job more attractive to strong teachers; lowering to four certainly wouldn't seem to elicit many pats on the back.

Maybe one of the most indicative statements came from a Republican Senator's tweet, where he called out educators for being, as he saw it, "at home stroking (their) ego(s)."

3. Some WV politicians do really value education

I entered the Senate Gallery with a group of teachers who seemed mostly enraged that Republicans on the Senate Finance Committee had proposed a four percent instead of five percent raise, considering that teachers had said they wouldn't return to work without five percent. Not long after we had entered and settled in to wait for the vote on the amended bill, Senator John Unger (D - Berkeley, 16; pictured above) came up and spoke with teachers, citing the motto of the protest in telling them to remain "#55strong."

It was Unger who protested when Senate Republicans broke with parliamentary procedure to give themselves a mulligan after one of the biggest legislative mistakes in West Virginia history. It was Senator Doug Facemire (D - Braxton, 12) who told Senate Republicans that by refusing to pass a raise at five percent, legislators were keeping kids who needed school for basic needs such as food from those resources. And of course, it was Senator Richard Ojeda (D - Logan, 7) who practically became a folk hero during the whole process for his willingness to stand up for teachers when few else would.

It should also be noted that though Senate Republicans were highly resistant of the five percent bill, Republicans in the House of Delegates were much quicker to pass a bill at five percent. Simply put, some politicians showed their care for education and the future of our state, but others spat (for a time) in the face of what appeared to be a clear majority in the public opinion favoring teachers.

4. There is hope in West Virginia

That hope lies in the classroom, where teachers who had the conviction to stand for something will soon return, examples and agents of social change – a living, breathing lesson.

That hope lies in the citizens that reached across party lines and found common ground on one of the most important issues of our state, whether they showed support by honking a horn, through social media, or by going out and actually standing in protest across the state or in Charleston.

That hope lies in the students from Boone County who were willing to organize a march with and for their teachers in the midst of the crisis, gathering over 1000 people to advocate for those who so often advocate for them.

That hope lies in the fact that this movement was for all state employees, and that all state employees will reap the benefits of it.

And ultimately, this movement brings hope because it shows that West Virginians will not just lie down and take unfair treatment from their elected representatives, even after legislative endangerment of the state's one-time status as a haven of labor movements and unions. As someone familiar with history, I couldn't help but recall the fighting spirit of Mother Jones and coal miners in early twentieth century West Virginia.

It shows that a state long bogged down by greed and exploitation is filled with people who love it and haven't given up on it, even as those same old problems rear their heads.

It's true that West Virginia has problems. But watching its teachers over the past few weeks, I saw that there's still hope in these hills.