Education in Me

After the viewing and reading about the DNC convention, I’ve been able to reflect on my own vision of education in America. Education should not be a controversial topic, but it is. To me, one of the best lines from the DNC was the line that was uttered, the “Chelsea Test”. If the school is not good enough for Chelsea, it’s not good enough for all children. The key words here is FOR ALL CHILDREN. Often times, the best education is only available to the elite types of people-people with the money and influence. As an educator, I am concerned that our education system is fractured. It’s not a perfect system, but we need to work together to fix the issues that our children face everyday.

I’ve spent most of my adult life trying to figure out what can I do to change and challenge the school system in a positive way. The answer is always evolving, but I’ve managed to stay true to what I’ve been taught and learned through this endeavor. I am a firm believer that one must “do good” to serve a purpose and that rewards come in many different aspects. In my ten years in education, I’ve managed to reflect on my education, and I’ve changed as a classroom leader.

Being a child advocate has its impact of who I am today. Education is always changing-evolving to meet the needs of learners. Schooling in the past had ALWAYS been about the teacher-my parent’s generation. Our educational system today is not my parent’s education system. We must transition from teacher-centered to student-centered. To master this, one must give up the comfort and status quo of education. Have students take charge in their learning by offering choice with guidance. Be pragmatic, authentic, and most importantly, listen to your surroundings (students, staff, parents, and the community). Continue to grow as learners and that teaching is never ending.

My final thought: the education system spends millions of dollars on trying to get students to be proficient. It is imperative that we continue to spend money to support our learners who need extra support, but on one thing that our people and lawmakers fail to understand is that our gifted population is starving. Starving  to be educated. The fallacy we have about our gifted learners is that they are able to learn on their own and that they don’t need the support. My response to this is an excruciating, NO! Gifted learners need to be educated like all other learners. We must not fail this population of learners because they deserve the right to an education.