Two years ago, I was making a final decision about whether to apply to Teach for America. I was in the Himilayan nation of Bhutan at the time, there for the fall of my senior semester of college, studying the countrys recent transition to democracy. My Grandpap, originally a 9th grade dropout from a coal mining family who became a college professor, had died the previous summer. Grandpap had shown me since forever that people are bigger than the environments they are born into, and so I started writing my application in a space-heated room as a Himilayan winter was setting in. I finished and submitted my application in Western Europe, from Belgium, where I stayed a month on the way home. Four months later, I had my final interview in Boston, across the street from the Fleet Center, where my dad had first taken me to see the Celtics play, my first NBA game, as a middle school birthday present. Next thing you know I am being trained for a summer in Oklahoma, and in a car headed down to Miami, FL. And now, two years later, the last bell has rung on the last day of school. TFA commitment complete. I came in believing this country does many things right, but the status quo isnt good enough, will never be good enough, and Ive found a job and a way of life where I can live those words every day. My kids this year rose an average of three years of reading growth -- three -- in this one year. Kids who couldnt write paragraphs in August handed in five page papers last week. In Teach for Americas highest competition, Sue Lehmann, I was a national semi-finalist, one of the top 17 out of 5,000 teachers. But I think back to the application process, from Bhutan to Belgium to Boston, the lifetime that led to it, and now these two years in Miami. This all just feels like a start. I will keep teaching in my school outside my TFA title because I think everyone deserves a fair shot and theres more to do. The commitment continues, the work to do my part for the kind of America that sent my Grandpap to college on the GI Bill, the kind of America I am proud to teach for. This is just the beginning.
Posted on: Thu, 05 Jun 2014 17:46:19 +0000
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