What about sub teachers, techs & specials - like computer, art or gym...'teachers' who are there every day? How do you handle that? I think every staff person should be appreciated even if it's only a "Thank you" card.
If you are going to make it a week just for teachers, it would be really important to ask the principal which staff members are teachers and which are support staff and not assume anything. We've found that making it a general staff appreciation week is SO much easier. You can do lots of low-cost or no-cost things (wash all the cars in the staff parking lot, for example, or make bookmarks for every staff member, etc.) and everyone is happy.
This can be a sticky situation. We are a small school in TX. We feel everyone at the school (from teachers, luch staff, custodians, librarian, aides, etc.) teach our children in some way. All the staff knows most every child. We have a total of 45 staff (from elem. to hs; cafeteria, custodian, admin., teachers, etc. combined) and 218 students (from elem. to hs). This did make it easier for us to include everyone in our Appreciation Week.
I feel you can have a single week as teacher appreciation and do all the goodies for them, as long as everyone agrees who is under the umbrella as teacher (ask the principle &/or admin. for their suggestion). It would be nice to have another week in which you would then show your appreciation for the support staff (budget avail.). You would not neccesarily have to give them something everyday, but maybe one special goodie and then a luncheon.
I hope this helps. I know we, as a newly formed PTO, are having to walk some thin lines and find a balance.
Focus on the rest of the staff during their days. National Library week is in April, National Counselor's week is in February. This way everyone is shown appreciation and no one feels exclude.
It's not right to give gifts to every teacher except one. Instead of the teachers feeling appreciated, everyone ends up feeling uncomfortable. I'm sure the librarian wasn't after the gift so much as she was trying to make a point that she actually is a teacher too. You can't have teacher's appreciation if you are going to leave one teacher out. (I almost made the same mistake my first year doing this. Fortunately the principal pulled me aside and let me know that the librarian is a member of the teaching staff.)
One very important point - in many schools the librarian is an accredited teacher and is a teacher in every sense of the word -- but sometimes parents are operating from their own outdated notions and do not realize this. The library teacher instructs the students in library science, just as the music teacher teaches music. It is very insulting for a parent's group to pick and choose between the certificated staff and give gifts to some teachers and not others, effectively singling out and "demoting" certain teachers. If I were the library teacher, I would be upset, too.
