One less...

Before this post, I posted a Black Voices article titled "Blacks With College Degrees Still Facing Great Hiring Challenges."

I just made myself one less by accepting a teaching job at Hutto High School. I'll go tomorrow at 7:15 in the morning to give my letter of eligibility from the alternative teacher's certification I've been pursuing from Texas Teachers. I am highly qualified to teach math and physics.

It feels good to say that.

It feels good to feel someone wants me for what I know and what I can bring to the table. Kind of like it used to feel to work for my previous high-tech employer.

Everyone I meet that's still at the company... don't like it, and wish they were doing something else.

It's stressful to be the survivors. To "hang on." To compromise life and health to keep the bottom-line healthy.

I want to prepare the next generation of engineers and scientist. My grandfather is a black-and-white photo on our family mantle. He's wearing a three-piece suit and a derby cocked to the side. I never met him. He died when my father was three-years-old. He was a teacher.

I've taught all of my life - martial arts, physics, poetry. I plan to bring all of that into play. My class will be, hopefully...wondrous.

From their vantage point, I hope my grandfather, grandmother and my parents are proud.

I am a teacher.

*****

What Teachers Make, or
Objection Overruled, or
If things don't work out, you can always go to law school

By Taylor Mali
www.taylormali.com

Original You Tube performance

He says the problem with teachers is, "What's a kid going to learn
from someone who decided his best option in life was to become a teacher?" (LAUGH)

He reminds the other dinner guests that it's true what they say about
teachers: Those who can do; those who can't, teach. (LAUGH)

I decide to bite my tongue instead of his
and resist the temptation to remind the other dinner guests
that it's also true what they say about lawyers.

Because we're eating: after all and this is polite company.

"I mean, you're a teacher, Taylor," he says.
"Be honest. What do you make?"

And I wish he hadn't done that
(asked me to be honest)
because, you see, I have a policy
about honesty and verbal smack downs:
if you ask for it, I have to let you have it.

You want to know: what I make?
I make kids work harder than they ever thought they could.
I can make a C plus feel like a Congressional Medal of Honor
and an A minus feel like a slap in the face.
How dare you waste my time with anything less than your very best?

I make kids sit through 40 minutes of study hall
in absolute silence.

No, you may not work in groups.
No, you may not ask a question.
Why won't I let you get a drink of water?
Because you're not thirsty, you're bored, that's why.

I make parents tremble in fear when I call home:
I hope I haven't called at a bad time;
I just wanted to talk to you about something Billy said today.
Billy said, "Leave the kid alone. I still cry sometimes, don't you?"
And it was the noblest act of courage I have ever seen.

I make parents see their children for who they are
and what they can be.

You want to know: what I make?
I make kids wonder,
I make them question.
I make them criticize.
I make them apologize… and mean it.

I make them write, write, write.
And then I make them read.

I make them spell definitely beautiful, definitely beautiful; definitely beautiful over and over and over again until they will never misspell either one of those words again.

I make them show all their work in math.
And hide it on their final drafts in English.
I make them understand that if you got this (brains)
then you follow this (heart) and if someone ever tries to judge you
by what you make, you give them this (“talk to”: the hand).

Let me break it down for you, so you know what I say is true:
I make a DIFFERENCE! What about you?