Grades are turned in. Music is filed (except for this stack right next to my desk, I just noticed. . . ugh). My classroom is clean-ish. It’s good enough for now, and it’s going to be used for summer camp, so whatever. Most of the loose ends are tied up, (ok a lot aren’t but when is my plate ever empty?) And while I do have some work to do to plan for summer projects I’m doing for my school… CLOSE ENOUGH. I’m going to say that the school year is done!
It seems every year has something unique that sets the tone for the year. These are moments that disrupt, or inspire, and somehow make the scope of the school year make more sense. There was my first year teaching at school, which was a moment in and of itself, my grandmother dying meant I missed much of the first month of school on year, Ollie being born which happened at the end of a school year, and being the father a baby which effected the following school year. Sometimes it’s world events, like the election, or the ever-present tragedy of school shootings. Other times it’s cultural moments like Hamilton, and the Black Lives Matter movement that make education more meaningful.
This year my second little one come into this world. I took paternity leave in the fall, which was the most amount of time I’ve taken off during the school year in my twelve years of teaching. This of course meant that I had the new experience of being the father of two. There were tragic school shootings and the ever-present guy, the 45th who continues to create policies and say things that directly contradict what it means to be a citizen. This create a shadow over everything we do as a school. Voices of women continue to rise that challenge what it means to be a man, how we must treat women, and face the reality of the lives of women in America.
All of these things tie into each other. They create a picture, a well to draw from. My motivation to do something about this world is heightened knowing that my sons will be inheriting what my generation leaves behind. While there is negativity and tragedy, we have to look straight into the problem, unblinking to understanding that in every problem there is an opportunity to do right by my students, my wife, my children, and myself.
There is one other thing about this past school year: my most important mentor, my co-music department chair retired. She was “my mirror, my sword, my shield.”
She was the greatest “boss,” I’ve ever had, and I’m really going to miss her. Every other mentor I’ve had has left this school or retired. Each time this happened, I comforted myself with the knowledge that she would be back next year.
In her presence, I could be insecure, and indecisive. I could always be a first year teacher when it was just me and her in a room. This was a wonderful space that I could escape to when I felt like I didn’t know what I was doing, which believe it or not happens far more often than I let on.
In a way next, the last eight years has been preparation for next year, the first time I’m really on my own.
via GIPHY
I feel some of the excitement of being a first year teacher. It’s going to be hard, there will be things I don’t know how to handle, but it’s also excitement, and new.
Year 8. Done.
It was a great year, at moments it was really difficult.
She persisted, and so did I.
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