Elevator Pitch

Yesterday I went to college. It was just for the night, but it was a great experience. Not only did it give me a chance to kick back and have fun for a night, but it also gave me the opportunity to share my experiences with some old friends.

About 8 of my friends from college were also back in Providence, so there was lots of catching up to do. Refining my experience so far into an elevator pitch really helps me realize what is important and why I do this. Maybe it took some cake batter-flavored vodka with glitter suspended in it to make me realize it, but I have a great job.

I teach 7th and 8th grade science in Bridgeport, Connecticut. The community is a lot like the south Bronx. My school is about 98% minority and a similar number receive free lunch. My job is really, really challenging. I need to be on 100% every minute that I teach, or the kids notice and take advantage of it. These kids were never taught that when they arrive at school every morning, they should be prepared to learn. They don't understand that by sitting quietly in class, they will be more successful in life as an adult and have more opportunities. In addition to this, they are 12 and 13, so add in the boy-girl and body-changing drama to all of it. Some of them don't get enough food each day. Some of them have difficult parents, or none at all, or have just been moved into foster care. And, at the end of the day, the district is most worried about keeping test scores up because of some misguided legislature from 10 years ago. But, once in a while, there is a kid who has not done a single bit of work all year who jumps up and helps his group make a race track so they can calculate the speed of a toy car. And then sometimes a small 7th grader, who doesn't say three words in a class period, stands up in front of the whole class and performs a dance describing the characteristics of living things. And even when two-thirds of a class fails the first exam, there are one or two questions that almost every student got correct because I worked really hard preparing that lesson. I have never worked so hard in my life, but I have also never had such an impact on so many kids' lives.