My 13 year old self

     This past weekend I helped Rosebro2 with his college essay. Not even sure how that is possible. I mean, is seems just like yesterday he was running around JBE, but now he is completing college applications and writing a college essay. He is applying to 4 colleges. Each college has a different essay topic. His top college pick had the following essay topic “What advice would you give the 13 year old you?”  He was struggling on this topic for two main reasons. One, he really wanted to have a great essay because this is his school of choice and two, he was confused by all of the things that he could tell the 13 year old Rosebro1-I mean, he has been through a lot in his 17 years. 

     As any good teacher would do, I started a web map to help him narrow down the choices. We started talking about the good things, the bad things, and the moments that really haven’t mattered. We narrowed them down to categories and started making a list of things that were of most important. (Sidebar: The moral of the story here is how very terribly boring a night at the Roses can be). He finally was able to wrap his head around a good beginning, middle and end. Then he composed a great essay. He brought it to me to edit and then he had a finished product.

     As he was typing up the final draft, I started thinking deeply about that question as a much older adult. What advice would I give to my 13 year old self?  My initial response was, “pick a better major.” Then I internally got mad at myself. I don’t mean it. I love our field of education even with our faults. I majored in Special Education as an undergrad. It wasn’t easy. There was plenty of theory, strategy, and clinical work. Then I got my first job and had not a clue what I was doing. Had it not been for some pretty amazing mentors those first two years, I would have never survived. So I brought back my thinking to what I instantly always have known, “Don’t lose your why?”

     I became a special education teacher because I am dyslexic and was a nonreader until grade 3. I hated school-I mean hated school. I threw up out of the back of my Mom’s Ford Esquire station wagon almost every day on the way to school. I had teachers who were used to students who could learn in a dark room. They didn’t know what to do with me. I knew there was something wrong, even though I could not name it. I knew I was different and I knew the teachers didn’t like me. I was finally given the most amazing teacher in 3^rd grade who changed the trajectory of my entire life. I never, ever want any student to feel the way I did in school. That is my why. It is why my standards are so high. It is why I can’t settle on good enough. It is why I constantly aim to provide higher levels of diversified instruction. It is why I believe that busy students aren’t necessarily learning ones. It is why I believe that EVER student can learn-not just the ones that are scoring well. It is why I will not settle with 27% of our students performing under grade level projections. And it is why I will never give up the good fight.

     So if I had to give advice to my 13 year old self, never forget your why. NEVER.