My Thoughts- Week 2

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My Thoughts

As I have sat and listened through out this week I have been wondering and thinking about many things.  Reading The Flat World and Education By Linda Darling-Hammond and listening to other’s viewpoints have made me think and wonder.  Here is what I keep coming back to and it is the same each time.  In the current America teachers are undervalued (by some), underpaid (by some standards), over worked, and exhausted. 

In December of 2003 I was a junior at Eastern Washington University sitting in my apartment, watching it snow, and pondering a program I was three months from graduating in thinking… “Is this what I really want to do?”  “I will make good money, but is their something else?”  That night around midnight I called home and announced, “Dad, Mom, I am going to be a Social Studies teacher.”  My parents, who are both teachers, literally asked, “What in the Sam hell are you thinking?”  Haven’t we taught you better than to be a teacher?” I know my Mom cried that night.

When I made this decision like many people entering the field of education, watching my equally intelligent friends go into careers and fields where they were going to lead financially affluent lives, I new I would not be making huge dollar signs, I would be working long hours, mentally and physically I would be bringing homes school work, my job would be thankless and undervalued to some, not all, some. 

After beginning my program in education, if I didn’t already know I quickly found out that educating students is going to be the hardest thing I ever do.  I will have to do it with little money from the district and at times with little resources.  I also learned in many cases if I wanted to better myself I would have to do this myself. I became a teacher because I wanted to do my best and make differences in someone else’s life.   

Often, in the field of education, I feel people loose track and forget why they first became a teacher.  It wasn’t for the glory, the big wages, and the insurmountable fame.  It was for the kids.  Who daily I do my best for with strong government mandates breathing down my neck, and with little resources.  When they first come into my room I am forced to take care of their personal needs and their feelings because they are no longer happening at home, and educate them with the tools society feels I need to do so.  It may not be fair and it may not be equal, but I wouldn’t make another choice.  I love what I do even though I see daily the unfairness and struggles. 

If I could go back to my apartment in Cheney and sit at my desk during a December snowstorm would I make the same decision?  Yes, I would. I would still make my Mother cry and become a teacher.  It isn’t our profession, which is bad it is the institution, which is running it.  I wouldn’t change being a teacher for the world.  Doing what I do has massive benefits to myself and to the world.  I hope others who are unhappy and frustrated with the system can think back to what they new going in and remember why they became an educator.  Remember, we do make a difference by caring and are not undervalued by all.  I think, at times, that makes up for my lack of pay, exhaustion and frustration.