My family and me backpacking to the bottom of the Grand Canyon, April 2013.
Life is a Journey
I graduated from Michigan State University in June 1983 with a degree in mathematics and a teaching certificate. I had never really desired to be a teacher, but being newly married and my husband ready to pursue a graduate degree, it seemed a good career choice for me. I taught two years in Minnesota while my husband earned his degree at the University of Minnesota. We began our family. He began his career. We made the choice that I would stay home to raise our children. I didn’t think about my certification or what I intended to do with it in the future.
For the next 25 years I raised our family and taught math in a variety of situations; adult education, home school, and private tutoring. During the last few years of that period I often contemplated, “What do I want to do with my life now? What do I want to BE when I grow up?” My youngest child was ready to enter high school and it was time for me to take a look at my future. The answer to my query was always the same: I wanted to teach math full time. Coincidentally, an all-girls high school was just opening. It was May 2010.
I applied for the job of teaching math and was hired. As a bonus, I got to teach biology also! I was informed that I needed to be certified, which I thought would be no problem; apply for a renewal and be done with it. I began to investigate, and discovered that I would have to “begin at the beginning”, which meant enrolling in a state certified program. This was a shock to me! I hadn’t planned on beginning graduate school in addition to returning to work full time, which seemed like enough of a challenge to me. My desire to teach math full time was so strong, though, I knew I had to do it.
I decided to stick with my alma mater and applied for the Master of Arts in Education program through MSU. The online format was the only way I thought I could possibly take classes and work at the same time. My goal at that time was to do the least necessary to renew my teaching certificate. I thought, three classes and I’m done. Grad school was (is) expensive, time consuming, and more than I wanted to do in addition to teaching full time. At the time I did not think that taking classes would help me in any way; they were just boxes I had to check off to get my certification. I had many years’ experience teaching math, what more could I learn? How arrogant of me.
My goals have definitely changed since beginning the program in July 2010. Each class has helped me to grow professionally in skills and knowledge, and personally as a learner. I charted my course as I searched for classes that pertained directly to the challenges that faced me every day in the classroom. Even classes that were required, such as the literature and reading classes that I grumbled as “having” to take, fascinated me and increased my knowledge in unexpected ways. As I continued with the program, my goal became to learn as much as possible to help me become the best teacher I could be.
I cannot say that I immediately fell in love with the program and never looked back. It has been a very challenging road for me. Halfway through the program I contemplated not finishing my degree; for someone my age (perhaps 10 years from retirement) in my teaching situation (small private school), having a master’s degree will not improve my pay nor position. It was difficult to justify the time and expense of continuing my classwork. Yet, I have come to understand that I do not know where this road leads, but I am on it and want to see it to the end. My goal now is to complete my degree, to never think I am done learning or improving, and to be open to all possibilities.
"The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step."
-Lao Tzu