Due to the COVID-19 epidemic, teachers stayed away from school environments for the first time throughout their profession and participated in the online education process. It is thought that this forced distance has created a change in teachers’ perceptions of the school. In this study, it is aimed to reveal the positive perceptions of teachers about the school in the distance education process and the function of the school in their lives. In the present qualitative study, 20 volunteer teachers who were in the distance education process were asked to write thank you (gratitude) letters for their schools. The data were collected through the gratitude letter form and analyzed with content analysis technique in five stages. Five themes and 22 codes belonging to these themes were obtained from the analyzes of the teachers’ gratitude letters. Themes derived from the gratitude letters; job satisfaction, school as a source of motivation, sense of belonging, richness of life, relationships and contact with others. Code distribution according to themes; five codes in the theme of school as a source of motivation, five codes in the theme of sense of belonging, four codes in the theme of richness of experience, five codes in the theme of job satisfaction, and three codes in the need for relationships and contact with others. The findings from this study show that teachers were able to identify and express their gratitude for the beneficial aspects of school in their lives during the pandemic period when they continued distance education. The contributions of the research findings to the literature are discussed in detail.