I’m frequently asked by my students why I want to be at teacher. The implication is usually why would anyone want to be a teacher; the pay is low and you have to deal with teenagers all day. I usually give a flippant response, make some joke about the dream that is pharmacy, and then fall back on a few cliché answers that, while I believe them, still sound canned. It’s a character flaw of mine that whenever I’m faced with a personal question that demands some sort of emotional or sentimental response, I revert to jokes and sarcasm. I’m aware of it, and hopefully this blog is a tool that will help me become more successful at fixing it. But the students make a good point. Why would anyone want to be a teacher? Like any other profession there are negatives: it’s one of the lowest paid professions that requires a college degree, trying to motivate students to learn something they don’t want to is stressful and exhausting, the people in position to make far-reaching decisions about education seem increasingly out-of-touch with what is actually happening in the classroom, parents seem less and less involved in their kids’ lives and want the schools to fill those gaps, and the list goes on. Every teacher could sit and talk your ear off griping about what’s wrong with education. Yet there are millions of us who teach, and many of us love what we do. So what is so rewarding about teaching that we’re willing to look beyond the negatives? Well, I can’t speak for everyone, but I can tell you why I teach.
I teach because teaching presents a large-scale problem to solve, and I love problem-solving exercises. My particular subject is science, mostly honors level, and trying to figure out a way to present the abstract concepts inherent to chemistry and physics is challenging. On one side I have a ton of scientific information, and on the other I have resistant teenage brains. I have to figure out how to get one into the other in such a way that it doesn’t fall back out again, but sticks around long enough to be a foundation for future learning and useful for practical application. In addition to that, I have to present it in such a way that my students aren’t just memorizing a bunch of facts, but are learning to think critically about what they learn in a way that is beneficial to all areas of life. All in 45 minutes per day. It’s a daunting task, but that’s also what makes it enjoyable. It taxes my ability to think logically and reason, but it also requires a great deal of imagination and creativity. It’s like a massive, real-life puzzle, and like a puzzle the harder it is the more satisfied you feel when you succeed. I only wish I were successful more often.
I teach because I want to be an inspiration to someone. A teacher’s actions – good or bad – can resonate for years. It can help determine so much of a person’s adult life: if they go to college, what they study, what career they choose. And it’s these choices made by students all around the world that will determine our future. It’s easy to forget sometimes the power that we have. They have to go through us before they can become our doctors and politicians, our CEOs and economists, our contractors and plumbers, our artists and writers, and even our new teachers. It doesn’t even matter if they are inspired to do great things like become president or cure Alzheimer’s. I’m happy if some of my students leave my class with a desire to learn more – not even about science necessarily – just more. Nothing is more rewarding for a teacher than when a former student tells us how much they learned in our class, and how much we helped them.
I teach because I like my students and want them to succeed. This may actually be a shock to those of them that firmly believe my sole desire is to make science class as hard on them as I possibly can. Be assured that is not at all the case. My desire is that they push themselves to succeed when challenged. Anybody can accomplish the easy tasks. What I desire is not for my classes to be hard only to cultivate the reputation of being a tough teacher, but for them to be hard because I set high expectations and believe that my students can meet them. If I didn’t care, I wouldn’t push them. Pushing them is hard. They resist, and it adds work and stress to the job. It would be much easier to take the path of least resistance, but then what would I be producing? I don’t know, but in most cases it’s probably not something I would be proud of.
I have a child that will be going to school in a few too short years. I have friends and family with their own young children. I have a definite vision for the future I want these children to grow up in. I want a world where critical thought replaces blind loyalty to dogma. I want a world that believes innovation is more valuable than entertainment. I want a world where empathy ends war and hunger and poverty. That may sound ridiculously idealistic, but I believe there are millions of people out there who share that vision. They are working towards these same goals everyday in a wide variety of ways, and every little step is progress. They volunteer to help the less fortunate. They pass laws that serve the people. They donate money to worthy causes. They speak out and speak up for those that don’t have a voice. Everyone should find some way they can contribute. But I know – I know – that an educated population is needed to accomplish those goals. It is an educated people that will think before they speak, that will find new ways to fix the world’s problems, that will care for their fellow humans and quit killing each other.
So what do I do?
I teach.
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