Sure, it's fun to watch professional athletes make the play. But when it comes to making a difference, kids think teachers can't be paid enough.

Okay, teachers, listen up. Your homework assignment is as follows: Take today's Mindworks column and tuck it away to read one evening when you're feeling particularly dispirited. When you wonder if your efforts really matter. When you question whether the kid rolling her eyes will ever thank you for that enlightening lecture on synonyms and homonyms. When thoughts of business school dance in your head.

In other words, any night this week.

Your students have spoken. And their overwhelming assessment is that your performance is way above minimum standards. When asked "Who should get paid more, a professional athlete or a teacher?" nearly 70 percent of 6,000 children responding said it wasn't even a contest. That percentage held true whether the child was a 6-year-old just learning to recognize words, a 10-year-old spellbound by science, or an 18-year-old focused on college.

"Teachers should get paid more than professional athletes because they're the real heroes," writes 10-year-old Mitchel Olson, a fifth-grader at Echo Park Elementary in Burnsville. "They get you ready for the real world. Athletes are fun to watch, but what teachers do sticks with you forever."

Thirteen-year-old Mat Hart of Mayer, Minn., was more direct: "Teachers should get paid more, cuz they gotta put up with kids like me."

Students praised their teachers for giving them life skills, putting up with "brats," buying school supplies with their own money, keeping them off drugs, coming in early and working late, for encouraging, prodding, and opening up a world of possibilities. High school senior Kelly Stanke still remembers the magic of her second-grade teacher. Her essay, which appears on the back page, will likely trigger memories for many readers of that one very special teacher you never forget. For many contributors, the smallest gesture had the biggest impact. One 16-year-old wrote that, every test day, his teacher comes in early to tutor him. Another noticed that, during conferences, "my teacher didn't even get supper."

"Teachers," summarizes Phong Phu Pham, a 15-year-old at Moorhead Junior High, "are like a second mother."

Athletes defended

While the number of students voting for athletes was far smaller, they're certainly a braver bunch, considering their essays were read not by Michael Jordan, but by . . . guess who? And their arguments were no less persuasive. Kids in this camp offered some important lessons of their own, including survival - nicely - of the fittest (while teachers number in the hundreds of thousands, 11-year-old Marty Pesis points out that only a few hundred among us will attain spots in the NBA); economics (are we really willing to raise taxes enough to pay teachers seven-figure salaries?); and some amusing mathematical equations, such as: How many teachers could live on Kevin Garnett's salary? (Teachers: don't look.) Above all, these students emphasized that the life of a professional athlete isn't as idyllic as it seems. Their career longevity is short, they risk injury, spend countless days and weeks away from their families, and have to put up with the media. Most compelling, they provide us couch potatoes and dreamers with tremendous entertainment and an escape from our own mundane lives.

"Even though a teacher is more down-to-earth with the same problems we have, such as money, kids and being busy, we don't want to experience a life like that," writes Nicole Peterson, 16, of Watertown, Minn. "We want to be somebody big. Athletes influence us the most by convincing us to follow our dreams because that is exactly what they did."

Eleven-year-old Derek Kunkel of Lakeville agrees. "An athlete brings joy to people," he writes, "like Randy Moss with his outstanding speed and great catches; Michael Jordan with his dunks, Mark McGwire with his homerun hits. That's why athletes should get paid more." But not all athletes. Even the biggest sports fans had harsh words for professional athletes who abuse their talents (or coaches or cameramen). Dennis Rodman won the unenviable title of least admired in the bunch.

This month's question also inspired those wonderful out-of-the-box thinkers who used amusing creativity in avoiding taking sides. Eighth-grader Vince Gellerman said both groups should work for free. "Entertaining millions of people should be enough pay for a professional athlete, and knowing that someone was enlightened by their existence should be enough pay for a teacher," he surmises. Other students suggested that teachers could get "traded" to better or less-desirable schools based on their performance, or that the two groups simply switch salaries as a check of their true dedication.

Wherever kids stood, most agreed that paying teachers an average of $39,000 annually, and athletes in the multimillions, both deserve reexamination. "Teachers should get paid more, athletes less, and no salary should go over the million-dollar mark," writes Kyle Chirpich, 13, of Wells, Minn.

Kyle, if mine ever does, I'll be the first to complain.

Pay inequity: athletes vs. teachers

"We should pay teachers the money for getting us prepared for the future, not playing a silly game. Teachers should be where the money goes. Show THEM the money!"

- Natalie Morgan, age 11, grade 6 Eden Prairie, Oak Point School

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"Pro athletes deserve all the money they make. They are the strongest and quickest people out there."

- Adam Lundeen, age 16, grade 11 Mound, Watertown-Mayer High School

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"I think it's stupid that some of us are willing to pay people billions of dollars for ... prancing around in funny uniforms kicking a dead pig through an oversized fork, or ... throwing a bumpy melon through an Easter basket with no bottom, or ... hitting a white ball (that looks like Frankenstein) with a stick. No offense, anyone."