For the Love of Education by Andi

For the Love of Education by Andi - January 2015 Scholarship Essay

What would be the one piece of advice that I would give to a teacher? I would tell he or she to really love the subject that they teach. When a teacher clearly enjoys the subject he or she is teaching, the students become more engaged. They become more interested in the subject because the teacher isn’t teaching because she “has to teach,” but instead is teaching because of her desire to teach. When it’s obvious that the teacher enjoys their subject, the students will become more eager to learn. In my experiences I always learned better when a teacher wanted to teach that subject. During my freshman year of high school, I took Pre-Advanced Placement World Geography. You could tell that my teacher was genuinely interested in the subject and helping the students succeed. I learned so much because of the interested nature of my teacher. However, during my sophomore year of high school, I took AP World History. The teacher was our head football coach and cared little to nothing about world history. In saying this, the only world history that I learned was self-taught and I did not receive a high score on the AP exam. Personally, being interested in the subject that he or she is teaching causes me to learn more.

I aspire to become an Advanced Placement English teacher for 11th or 12th graders. Unfortunately, English is often among those overlooked subjects, the subjects that are ridiculed and remarked as useless. One of my thoughts on being a teacher is to show my students that English doesn’t belong with those subjects. English contains a myriad of worthy characteristics from its useful grammar to timeless literature. I’ve had multiple experiences, particularly in AP courses, where the teachers don’t care about education. Those experiences have shaped my desire to become an AP teacher. I want to help students because I want them to succeed. I want my students to look back and remember how I gave them the best experience possible.

In conclusion, a rule of thumb for any profession is to love what you do. I know that phrase seems overused, but it’s true. If you love your profession, then it will show when you’re helping others. That phrase helped me realize that my true calling was in education not in the medical field. So, to my past teachers, please love what you do because the students will be able to tell if you actually care.