Days 3-5: B&G of Maui, Surfing, Luau!

Work hard, play hard.

The former of this phrase took hold on Day Three, as Westcoast moved to the Boys & Girls Club of Maui. Initially, many of us had questions -- what would the kids be like? Would they welcome us in, or would we be intruding on their routines? Would they like us? What would the facility be like? These thoughts were in our minds as we loaded up our vehicles (most notably, the BradMobile) and headed across town on our short commute to the Boys & Girls Club.

Our group throwing up the "shakas" in front of the Boys & Girls Club of Maui.

From the second we walked in, we were adored by the kids of the Boys & Girls Club. The two days we spent at the club were nothing short of amazing. We spent about six hours each day working with the kids of Maui, who ranged in ages 6-17. We knew coming in that many of the kids of the club live under the poverty line, but that did absolutely nothing to damper their spirits -- in contrast, they actually seemed to be some of the most upbeat and personable kids that I have ever worked with. If the Maui Airport captured the “ALOHA” spirit of the islands, then the Boys & Girls Club captured the “Mahalo” spirit of the islands (meaning “thank you”) as all of us were so grateful to have the opportunity to meet and enjoy time with the kids.

There were countless opportunities to interact with the kids, some of which were already in place by the club while others were brainstormed and provided by the members of WestCoast -- us. Some of the highlights of the visit included a game of Sham Battle, which is kind of a weird hybrid game of dodgeball that was started in Maui; a Scavenger Hunt created by WestCoast trip members; intense games of Drip, Drip, Drop, which is essentially the water verseion of Duck, Duck, Goose, in an effort to beat the unusually hot temperatures in Maui for this time of the year; a B&G vs. WestCoast game of two-hand touch football; arts & crafts; Bumper Pool, another game authentic to the Hawaiian islands; ping-pong, billiards, basketball -- the list goes on and on.

The end of our time at the Boys & Girls club was an emotional one, with many kids writing letters to WestCoast members and chasing after cars as we drove away. In one instance, a kid literally had to be pulled off of a WestCoast trip member because they couldn’t bear the thought of us having to leave! As we reflected on our short time at the club, we talked about how tough it was to leave such great kids -- but also how the fact that it was so tough meant that we did really great work, which we should be incredibly proud of. Going forward, our community service work in Maui will be environment-based work, but we already can’t wait to meet the kids at the Boys & Girls Club of Honolulu, and can only hope to have just as an amazing experience there as we did here in Maui.

Selfie Nation is alive and well in Maui.

Next up was a fun-filled Wednesday that would make any tourist proud. We started our day by taking surfing lessons from a company based in Maui. Surfing, like everything else we’ve done so far, was amazing. When we got there, four instructors introduced themselves and gave us an extremely short (~10 minute) lesson on how to surf. This was incredible to me. Ten minutes?! I can’t even cook a meal in ten minutes. Now you’re going to tell me how to do something I’ve never done, in a place I’ve never done it, all in ten minutes? To say I was cautious was generous.

However, once we got into the water, everything flowed together beautifully. Not only did everyone successfully stand up on their board on a wave, but some of us even caught our own waves at the end of this! The “cherry on top” were the two sea turtles that were spotted, which swam right underneath a couple of our boards as we were waiting for those perfect waves to come through. The experience was captured by a professional photographer and everyone pitched in to make sure that we’d be able to hold onto these memories forever.

Post-surfing selfie with one of the kiddos in (you guessed it) Maui

Following surfing was lunch in Kihei (the city surfing was in) followed by an authentic Hawaiian luau at night. We knew that going to the luau wasn’t enough -- we had to dress the part. Some of us picked up some “Hawaiian Dad” shirts that would make any slightly overweight, mid-40s male proud.

Off to the luau, where we were treated to a pig roast, other Hawaiian cuisine, and a show for the ages. The show didn’t only include the “typical” luau aspects -- grass skirts and ukelele -- but also provided story-telling of the Hawaiian culture in the form of song, dance and ritual. There was even a part of the show where the audience was invited to go up to the stage to learn how to “Hula” (without the hoop), and it was so great to see almost every single member of our trip eagerly get up on to the stage to strut their stuff. The show was concluded with fire twirling, sending all of us off into the night with smiles on our faces and good food in our stomachs.

Next up for us is work at “Eco Maui” where we will learn about the physical preservation of this beautiful island, and then a 4th of July celebration (for us Americans) before we head off to Honolulu for the next part of our trip.

Mahalo for reading and aloha ‘oe!

BD

Days 1-2: Welcome to Maui

Aloha from Maui!

My name is Brad DeFauw, and I am lucky enough to be one of the trip leaders on this year’s 2015 Hawaii Community Service trip. Over the course of the next 18 days I will be writing from the tropical, 80 degree, breezy shores of Hawaii to share some of the exciting things that we’ll be doing on the trip. The trip promises to be full of rewarding work as well as unforgettable experiences that we’ll all be able to carry with us forever.

Let’s start from the very beginning: Day Zero. Before any of the kids arrived, this year’s Trip Director (Rebecca) met with myself and the other Trip Leader (Shaye Lynn) a day early in Hawaii to get settled in, organized and ready to go. Rest assured -- we made sure to scope out all of the best beaches and restaurants in Maui. For the kids. Yeah, definitely for the kids.

This is not a picture out of a magazine. We took this. With the help of some filters. But still.

Once Rebecca, Shaye and I were all unpacked and adjusted (to the best of our ability) to the six hour time difference, we couldn’t wait for the kids to show up. Day One consisted of meeting everyone at the Maui Airport, a beautifully small airport that included a door-free lobby. It perfectly captured the “ALOHA” spirit of the island.

Sidebar: What does ALOHA actually mean? I didn’t know before I came here, but the word “ALOHA” is actually an acronym for something much more powerful. Each letter stands for an authentic Hawaiian word that perfectly captures the spirit of the islands…

A - Akahai: kindness

L - Lokahi: unity

O - Olu’olu: agreeable

H - Ha’aha’a: humility

A - Ahonui: patience

Aloha is used here in pretty much every sense of the word you can think of: in a greeting (Aloha!), in a farewell (Aloha!), as an adjective (it was so Aloha of the small fish to clean the big fish’s teeth!), etc. The idea is that any way you use the word, you’re not truly captured the essence of “Aloha” unless you are filling all five of its characteristics: kindness, unity, being agreeable, humility, and patience. I thought this was a really awesome way to begin the trip. Anyways...onwards.

All the kids arrived in the Maui airport (yay!) and immediately started to get to know each other and their trip leaders. We played some icebreaker games such as Indian Chief and Bang! while enjoying snacks and the beautiful, breezy Hawaiian sunshine. Did I mention that it was breezy here? It’s really breezy here. It’s fantastic.

Once everyone got to the airport we headed to our hotel, the Maui Seaside. The hotel is a small, quaint hotel that’s right on the water in Maui. Once everyone was settled in, we discussed some basic pool/common space rules before letting everyone had some free time. Again, everyone immediately dove right into meeting each other -- some opting for soccer, others for a dip in the pool, and others for a relaxing poolside lounge after a long day of traveling. After ordering some pizza, discussing the behavioral expectations for the trip, and having everyone lose to yours truly in Rock, Paper, Scissors, it was time to go to bed and get ready for a big Day Two.

Our beautiful seaside hotel.

Day Two was truly incredible. It was an early wake-up, as we woke up at 7:00AM Hawaiian (although that’s 1 PM Eastern so is it really that early? I digress.) to embark on our snorkel cruise. But Brad, what exactly is a snorkel cruise? Well, let me tell you.

Our first stop was the world-famous Molokini crater, a sheltered islet about a half hour off the coast of Maui. Because the crater is sheltered, we were able to see many species of fish in their natural habitat -- over 250 to be exact! After we were done exploring the carter we traveled to the island of Lana’i, where we were once again lucky enough to see a wide array of wildlife in their natural, secluded, protected habitat. We even saw a Green Sea Turtle and a couple of the fish made famous from “Finding Nemo” which are indigenous to Hawaii and can only be found here.

Ok, fine, I didn't take this picture. But this is the Molokini Crater, the first stop on our snorkel cruise.

After a full day in the sun we ate some Mexican food and prepped for our first day of Community Service at the Boys & Girls Club of Maui tomorrow morning.

The motto that I imagine for myself and for the kids on this trip is “work hard, play hard.” So far, we have definitely played hard (really hard), but I know that I speak for everyone here when I say that we are so excited to get to work and make a big difference in Maui starting tomorrow morning.

I’ll close this blog in true Hawaiian fashion:

Mahalo for reading and aloha ‘oe,

Brad

The Blog is Back! (Kinda)

Over the course of the next two weeks or so I'm going to be writing some blog posts from out here in Hawaii. The reason I'm doing this is because the parents of the kids I'm working with read through all my previous blog posts, very obviously decided that they needed me to capture their kids' experiences, then said the following to me:

Parent 1: Brad, you and I both know why you're here. I'm going to write a number on this check. You tell me how many zeroes need to come after it.

The rest is history.


OK, so that might not actually be 100% factually accurate, but either way I'll be writing a blog through my company this summer and wanted to share it with all of you. The company is going to edit out my blog posts to their liking, but as Brad DeFauw Exclusive Club Members I am going to post all the "raw" posts to this site for you all to read.

That's pretty much it. Enjoy. Mahalo!

BD

End of the Year Reflection

It feels a bit awkward calling this post an "end of the year" reflection. After all, as most schools around the capitol are letting out this week or have already let out, my school is still in session, and far from coasting in. This week, we are taking final exams, and have another week of instruction next week before a final "spirit week" that includes a graduation & gate ceremony for our 8th graders who are going on to high school next year. Regardless, I have a bit of time to write today, as I am not proctoring an exam, and decided that now would be as good of a time as any to wrap up my first year of teaching.

People tell first-year teachers that they will probably hate their job the first year. In fact, I have been told, many of the best teachers around the country had terrible first years, to the point of walking out on their job in the middle of the day -- no two weeks notice, no goodbyes, just a staunch "I'm done." While this has not been my reality, I can't say that my first year of teaching has been an enjoyable one. Much of the optimism I had towards teaching at the beginning of the year has been replaced with a tired attitude towards the profession; an excited attitude to stand in front of the classroom to mold minds is now instead replaced by feelings of dread and anxiousness as I hit my alarm clock in the morning and prepare to head into the lead role of my classroom.

It's very possible that a variety of factors may have played into what I'm currently feeling. Firstly, the school I teach at is at on an extended school year. While other schools around the country are winding down and looking towards the end of May and June with excitement, we instead continue to push our scholars hard towards "higher levels of mastery" and "getting ahead" of their peers across the city. While this is certainly being accomplished, it's at a certain point where you have to ask yourself if it is worth it. I walked into this school this year surrounded by some of the most positive, joyful teachers that I have ever encountered, many of whom have been at this school or in urban education for multiple years. This gave me hope that teaching in "tough areas" wasn't really that bad, and that it was a bit overrated. However, in June, I now see tired faces, joy replaced with exhaustion and a desire for the year just to be over. There's also the fact that the school day runs on an extended time (starts at 7 AM, ends at 4 PM, I leave around 5-6 on a normal day), many of the children we teach go home every day to incredibly difficult situations (many do not have a father, all live in poverty), I wasn't entirely sure what to expect coming into this situation -- the list continues. What is for certain, though, is that the feelings I have about teaching now are certainly not what I had hoped them to be in August.

I will be back next year, but my mentality coming into it will not be the same. I will admit that coming into this year, I was extremely naive, and saw myself having the impact on the scale of a "Dead Poets Society" or "Freedom Writers" level. Robin Williams just made it look so damn easy.

People told me that teaching would push me to a level that I could not possibly prepare myself for, but I scoffed at that. "They don't think like I do," I told myself. "I'll be different."

What I now know is that the truth about teaching, especially in urban areas, is that there's only about one good day a week, if you're lucky. More realistically, there's about one good day every two weeks, and if you're really lucky, you get a great day once every month or two. In order to survive, you need to find that day and keep it in your heart. Because on those other bad days -- and they get really bad -- you need to remind yourself what that looks like.

For me, that looks like a scholar named Kiersten making "Century Club" for one week of the year, which denotes scholars who perform the best behaviorally in a given week at my school. Every other week of the year, Kiersten was at the lead of the class in detention and out-of-class referral numbers, but for one week of the year, she behaved well, she was a leader, AND she was happy.

That looks like a scholar named Tykivis, who, after by far the toughest day of my short-lived teaching career (I pretty much snapped and looked like this while in the middle of class and looked like this walking out of work) came up to me at the end of the day and as opposed to going to hang out with his friends, decided to tell me how great he thought I was and how happy he was to have an opportunity to get me as a teacher. How lucky am I to receive that, I thought, after I had for so long loved so many of my teachers but had been too timid to tell any of them how much they meant to me.

But that's the truth within teaching. It's a largely thankless job. I just got done reading Tony Danza's book, "I'd Like To Apologize to Every Teacher I've Ever Had" in which he chronicles his one year teaching one class at a low-performing high school in the middle of Philadelphia. While Mr. Danza certainly did not have an accurate representation of what it's like to be a full-time teacher, he did bring up a few really good points about the profession. My favorite scene of the book is when he made an analogy between teaching and boxing (The Boss' profession before becoming an actor). Teaching, Danza says, is a lot like boxing, in the way that you have to bring it every single time you step in the ring. You have to prepare yourself for anything that can and inevitably will happen, and when it does happen, you can't lose your composure.

The difference between boxing and teaching is that in boxing, you're allowed to hit back. In teaching, you have to take the punches day after day, week after week, and month after month -- and then try to keep a positive attitude. On top of that, you aren't thanked for taking the punches, but are merely viewed as someone who is filling their role in the system, much like a punching bag. But what makes the best teachers are the ones who are able to step away from that idea, which is truthfully very much a reality of teaching in urban education. You have to remember the bright spots, even if they are only a spot which is surrounded by a coat of darkness and negativity that this profession seems to surround many of us on a daily basis.

As I go into my second year of teaching, and my first full-year of being a lead teacher in the classroom, I will remember Kiersten's Century Club Week. I will remember Tykivis' selflessness. I will remember the smallest of interactions with these children which tell me, even if it isn't with words, that they appreciate, or at least have a slight amount of respect, for what I'm trying to do here. I will remember also the deeds of others inside and outside of this building that tell me that success in urban education is possible, and that maintaining a healthy state of mind in such a stressful environment is realistic. Finally, I will remember the stories of all the teachers who had absolutely miserable first years -- filled with tears, screaming and hopelessness -- who came back and made a promise not to be a great teacher, but only to get better. Day by day, week by week, month by month.

That is my promise to myself going forward. In my mind, I'm not a great teacher today, I won't be a great teacher tomorrow, and I probably won't be a great teacher at this time next year. But if I make a commitment to myself to keep getting better, in the face of all the adversity that being a teacher brings, maybe one day I will be -- and if I'm lucky, maybe even a couple of the students I teach will think I'm as influential as John Keating.

Carpe (every) Diem.

-BD

Thoughts on the Strongsville Teachers' Strike

First off, before this gets going: familiarize yourself with the teachers' strike in my hometown of Strongsville, Ohio. If you don't know what's going on there, this will just be an angry rambling about a subject you have no informed opinion about, and no one really wants to read that. Some good articles surrounding the strike can be found here, here and here.

Also, the picture below does a pretty good job of summarizing where we are at with negotiations right now.

The strike started March 4. For those are you who are not good at math -- that's totally fine, I'm a math teacher and google is a great resource. Scoring at home, today (April 23) is the 50th day that the Strongsville teachers have been on strike. That's 50 days where high school students, especially those in higher-level AP classes (which the district prides itself on) have not been receiving the type of high-quality instruction necessary to get them ready for college, and in a more short-term perspective, their AP tests, which could potentially save them time and money in college and allow them to go straight into the courses that are in their main line of study, as opposed to taking general ed classes.

Meanwhile, guys like this are being left in control, as opposed to teachers who are trained and, as someone who went through the system, are damn good at their job.

Now, before this gets to where it's going to get to, let me just say that when this started, I really wanted to be on the side of the teachers. Really, I did. As a fellow teacher, and a biased blogger, I feel that teachers are generally very under appreciated in society today. People in the US like to complain about the quality of teachers, lack of difficulty to enter the profession and our low test scores compared to other industrialized nations, but no one wants to realize why that is the case. If you look at other countries that have top-notch education systems such as South Korea and Finland, you will find fundamental differences in the way that education is viewed. In these countries, teachers are valued along the same lines as doctors, and are paid like it, too. Teachers that go to Finland leave saying that the degree of respect and trust that are given to teachers is nothing like what they see in the US (source). Parents in these countries understand the value of school, from its academic to its moral purpose (source) and do not see it simply as a place where kids go while you're at work.

However, like doctors in this country, it is not easy to become a teacher in countries like South Korea and Finland. Before this gets any more off topic, the bottom line is that for education to change for the better in the United States, we need better teachers and we also need society to do a better job of giving teachers the benefit of the doubt. So, in short: respect teachers, pay them like you respect them, and then you'll see better applicants enter the field.

This is ultimately why I wanted to side with the Strongsville teachers. "Let's give them some respect!" I said. "Higher wages need to be our first step!" I said. "This is going to leave an incredibly positive impact on education for years to come," I said.

But then this happened.

This, too.

And this.

And this.

Teachers posted signs like the one below in the neighborhoods of substitute teachers who had come in to Strongsville City Schools during the strike.

Teacher behavior during the strike has even spurred on political cartoons like the one shown below.

Come onnnnnnnnn, you guys!

This was such a big moment! We were going to make such a big change with how education is viewed in society! All you had to do was shut up and let the public speak!!

Watch the first three minutes of the video, Strongsville teachers. Listen to the parent. She WANTED to trust you. She tried to trust you.

You blew it.

So now, I can't trust the teachers. I also can't trust the board, who has refused to make any sort of concessions in their proposal to get the teachers back in the classroom. However, this post isn't about the Board.

This is about the teachers of Strongsville, Ohio, who blew it. You blew it. YOU. BLEW. IT.

The subs are openly under-qualified for the subjects they are teaching. The board has always had a bad rep in Strongsville. Everything was looking up for the teachers. But then, as opposed to taking the high road and likely getting what they wanted in the end, Strongsville's teachers decided to go against the moral lessons they teach (explicitly or subliminally) every day that bullying is bad, we should be good to each other and that in times of adversity, violence in not the answer in any form.

To be fair, this does not represent every teacher in Strongsville. Actually, those teachers who are bullying the substitutes are in the vast minority compared to the teachers who are doing what the need to do by being quiet and letting the process play itself out.

Unfortunately, this is not what the public will remember. The public will remember the teachers who bullied the subs by cursing and yelling in their faces (literally) as subs came into the city to try to work.

I will too. I will remember these teachers more than the majority of teachers who were doing the right thing, and that really is a shame.

To the teachers who bullied and acted more immature than the students and continue to do so throughout this process: how can you legitimize yourself as an educator, or even as a person? How can you go to bed at night feeling that the decisions you've made that day are for the benefit of society? Namely, how does yelling and cursing at a human being who is trying to go in and teach children make you a good person? Sure, the subs aren't doing as good of a job as you probably think you could. But they're trying. That should, and does count for something. How can you expect children in your classroom to behave with class, maturity and respect for each other when you cannot model those things yourself? This next statement is coming from an educator and more importantly, a human being: you should be ashamed of yourself.

The whole situation is disgusting. While I never claimed that Strongsville was my favorite place in the world, I had a certain amount of respect for the place, and for the teachers that had given me an opportunity to go out into the world and pursue whatever career path that I'd like.

It has been incredibly disheartening to see many of these same people who I looked up to throughout the course of my youth turn around do exactly the things that they told me not to do. Hypocrisy at its finest.

 However, if there is a metaphoric diamond in the rough of all this, it is the students of Strongsville. I have read multiple articles like this one which detail the students' refusal to stoop to their teachers' level and continue to work hard in the face of all this.

The Strongsville teachers strike had an opportunity to become a huge win not only for the teachers of Strongsville, but for teachers everywhere. Instead, the events that have occurred in Strongsville in the past month and a half (and however longer they might continue to occur) will leave scars on the community for years or maybe even decades to come. It also puts a huge dent into the fight many teachers are facing here in the US for the respect and dignity that is necessary for higher levels of educational quality.

It is hard to imagine a scenario in which the teachers and BOE come out of this with any sort of respect from the community -- parents and children alike. The teachers in Strongsville have turned a golden opportunity into one of shame, and for that they cannot be forgiven.


Sincerely,
Brad DeFauw
Class of 2008

Looking Up From the Bottom

It feels good to write again. I really wish I had more time to, but my schedule really doesn't allow it. And I'm not saying that my schedule doesn't allow it as someone who can sit around and play video games while not "making time" to write. I actually just don't have enough time to write. Ever. The only reason this is even getting done now is because I'd rather do this than go home and deal with my roommate's cat, who seems to think that everything but the scratching post I bought her is actually that scratching post. So here I am.

People who know me know that I (used to) really like working out. I think it's a great way to relieve stress and promotes a ton of self-confidence. In college, I used to work out 4-6 days a week. Now, I am lucky if I get 2 days in, and it's usually the weekends.

The schedule that I am running on right now asks for a minimum of eleven hour days, with thirteen hour days hardly an abnormality. There are many days when I come in an hour before the sun comes up, and leave much after it has gone down. Since coming back in January, my average weekly hours hover around 60. That wouldn't be so bad (well, it might) if I were getting compensated for those hours in overtime or even some sort of baseline salary. However, here I type, working on $0 income this year. I know that a Master's Degree is getting paid for, but I'm not anywhere close to reaping those rewards yet. It's been a bit overwhelming at times.

So, here is what I learned: teaching is hard. I think I've said this before. Actually, I know I have. Sorry for being repetitive. But, it needs to be said. What makes teaching unique is that it isn't hard in the way that you have to adjust to it and then it gets a little easier. If that is the case, I definitely am not anywhere close to reaching it. Teaching is hard in its daily tasks -- creating lessons, calling parents, creating homework, and then all the other things that a job asks you to do. I never imagined teaching would be this demanding. After hearing that my program was experiencing a fair number of dropouts halfway through the first year, one of my co-workers said to me, "Teaching is not a profession for the weak." You really have to be committed to this thing if it's going to work for you. Really, really committed.

I think that these pressures really took their toll on me in the first half of the year, as evidenced by my less-than-cheery end of the year post back in December. Since then, however, things have changed a bit. Admittedly, I hope that things couldn't get too much worse than they were, but still, improvement is improvement. Following the same format of my venting post, here's an update on things that I have been doing in the past month and a half or so.

School
Here's the thing about working in education: nothing is ever going to be perfect. Here's the thing about working in urban education: it is rare that things are ever going to be going well. It's understandable why working in urban education has such a huge burnout rate, with long hours, lower salaries and so on. Now that I have come to grips with that, I am better able to do my job.

When I wrote last, I wasn't happy that I wasn't being given any real responsibility at the school. That has changed massively. I now work by myself with a small group of children, all of whom were failing. I've been having a lot of success with them, as many of them ended up pulling up their grades in the course by the end of the quarter. Behavior is a completely different issue -- many of them think that they don't need the class and would rather be taking history -- but that issue will remain a separate issue because this is a post about positivity. Hooray, passing grades!

I have also been asked to substitute teach on a couple occasions when teachers have been sick, which is a bigger deal than you might think. Again, this means I am in a classroom completely by myself. Also, the classes that I was asked to sub for are some of the poorest scoring (behaviorally and sometimes academically) in the school. So, substitute teaching was ridiculously hard, especially because I didn't know any of them by name. Still, I was asked to do it, which is a big confidence boost for me about what my superiors think I am capable of handling at this point.

DC/Social
I am going to merge these two together since they really are dependent on each other. I realized that a lot of the reasons I initially didn't like DC at first is because of the social life I carried here. It wasn't like Ohio State, where I had a plethora of people that I could turn to when I just wanted to get a little stupid and kick back after a tough day/week/whatever. While DC has not magically transformed into Columbus and probably never will, from a social standpoint, I have begun to appreciate little things about DC more.

While I maintain that DC is overrated as a major city, the fact of the matter is that it is still a major city. That means that there are people in it. This cannot be overstated. I know so many people that work in some city I've never heard of, where (it can be assumed) there are not a large amount of people around to partake in fun stuff with. While there is a ton of room for activities in these areas, there are not any people to share these activities with, which kind of defeats the purpose entirely.

I've done a much better job of getting involved out here. I joined a couple social sports leagues, flag football (big shout out to the Fire Breathing Rubber Duckies) and basketball (more subdued shout out to Free Agent Team A) and have met a lot of really awesome people through these. They've been a blast and I can't recommend social sports leagues enough to people who feel like they don't know enough people in a new city. I also went to sports bars for the teams who hold my sports allegiances, including the Browns and OSU, and had a great time with that as well. While going to a bar completely by myself was admittedly a bit awkward at first and a new experience, I am very happy that I did it and will definitely continue it once football is back in the fall.

An interesting trend I've noticed since stepping out of my comfort zone and going "out there" socially is that I have a lot less animosity towards DC ever since then. What I've realized is that it's not really at all about the city that you're in, so long as the people that you're in it with are people you enjoy being around. No matter where I've been in my life, as long as I'm surrounded by good company I can't complain. So, although these leagues are a bit pricy and I always spend too much money going to the Browns Backers Bar (insert Cleveland drinking joke here), I have every intention of continuing these trends going forward.

Last Words
Wait, that's it?

Who knows, maybe I will look back on my first semester of teaching and realize that it was my version of a quarter-life crisis. My hope now is that it's in the rear view mirror, gone forever in the smoke of bad vibes.

Teaching still is and will remain to be incredibly, incredibly difficult. What will make it enjoyable, though, is how I handle myself when I'm not teaching. This holds true for everything in life, not just teaching. When you're in a bad mental place going into work, you're more likely to stay in that bad place, and it's just a spiral of negativity. What I need to do from here is find a time that is just for me, and guard that time. It is arguably just as important as anything I do in class.

In order for me to give the children I teach the best version of myself as a teacher, I need to give that best version to myself in the form of a positive mental state. Or something like that. I'm not sure. Either way, while things out here are still not ideal, they are getting better. At the end of the day, positive momentum is all you can really ask for.

BD

Great Thought From Someone Who Is Not Me

I'm not writing today (although I plan on writing again soon), but I wanted to pass along something that I read today anyway. The following excerpt comes from a fellow (more acclaimed) blogger named Dan Meyer, who has been leading nation-wide discussions on education reform, particularly in math classrooms. Dan actually quotes another blogger, Shawn Cornally (INCEPTION!) in a post he made today. As someone who just started out in teaching, I thought it was particularly relevant to what I'm experiencing now and what I am planning on doing with the rest of my life. Dan writes:

Twin Pressures On Good Novice Teachers

February 11th, 2013 by Dan Meyer

Shawn Cornally:

Hence, the argument for higher teacher pay: we’ll stay in the classroom longer, rather than jumping ship when our salary schedule is incremented less than inflation (i.e. making less the older I get, like my second year of teaching). In other words, it’s not student achievement you’re directly paying for, it’s avoiding turnover.

“Maybe that’s not a bad thing?” you say. “Some of my best teachers were young and excitable.” you opine.

So here's the rock: there are certain teachers who thrill a great deal more to the challenge of good teaching than to any missional obligation to care for children. (See: McMatherson, Mathy; Nowak, Kate; Pershan, Michael.) As teaching gets easier, these teachers are forced to impose tougher and tougher challenges on themselves (because teaching itself doesn't offer that kind of differentiation) just so they can stay interested in the field.

And then there's the hard place: the demands of good teaching, particularly in charter systems, are often unmanageable for anybody but the young, single, and childless — long hours, comparatively low pay, and only a thin veil of separation between you and your work.

Without even glancing at a census table, it's possible for us to see that the rock and the hard place close in on good novice teachers at almost exactly the same time. The job becomes untenable at about the same time that it becomes unchallenging.

If you like Dan's blog (I would highly recommend it to any math teacher), you can read it here.