The Value of Education by Grace

The Value of Education by Grace - June 2017 Scholarship Essay

As a 6-year-old I wanted to be a teacher. I would go home after school every day and teach an imaginary classroom full of kids with names like Crystal and Amy, write up lesson plans for them based off of what I had just learned that day, discipline them when they talked too much or threw imaginary erasers across the room, and even hold parent teacher conferences, complete with a table and two empty chairs for the student and their guardian. I created a fantastic world for myself as a child in which my greatest dream could be realized.
When I entered middle school the imaginary class vanished, and my fantasies over being a teacher were replaced with dreams to be a philosopher, a Shepard, or most realistically, a business owner. I saw a vision of myself in the future that was just as bright and shiny as the vision I had as a child, but now my profession had changed. I no longer wished to be a teacher, since I spent all my days sitting in a classroom learning material I didn’t care to learn, with kids I didn’t care to like, from teachers who didn’t care about me. Its really no surprise my desire to be a teacher vanished.
All of my elementary teachers were wonderful. They smiled brightly, laughed loudly, were energetic and involved and created an environment that was safe, comfortable, and beautiful. It was a world I loved so much I couldn’t let it go, so every day when I went home I recreated it in my own way so that I could exist inside my 3rd grade classroom for as long as possible. My middle school teachers were boring and mean. They droned on about math and history, they sneered at kids from behind binders and textbooks, they yelled and sent people to stand in the hallway, and I was glad each and every day that I got to leave, and that I got to exist in a world that was separate from my middle school.
In high school things changed again. I spent the first two years shrugging whenever someone asked me the plans for my future, and I spent this past year confidently saying I was going to be an elementary school teacher. I spent this past year going home and sitting in my room day dreaming about what posters to hang up in my classroom, how I was going to handle rowdy kids, the inspirational speeches I would deliver when things got tough, and the beautiful existence I was sure I was going to live the day I became a teacher.
What I wanted to be when I grew up depended completely on the environment I was in. At a time when school was fun, exciting, colorful and filled with hope, I wanted nothing more than to spend as much time as possible in a learning environment. At a time when school was terrible, difficult, boring and void of any excitement or joy, I wanted nothing more than to spend as much time as possible away from a learning environment.
Now, I’m at that time again where school is that place of joy, excitement, inquiry, and hope. I am on the daily surrounded by teachers who are kind and fun, who are engaging to listen to a learn from, and who teach lessons that I see as valuable, and that I care to listen to and engage in. I want to be a teacher again, and it’s all because of the wonderful education I was lucky enough to receive.