New Teachers Change Lives Too- Part 1

During the summer, I work as a new teacher coach for TEACH Charlotte under the non-profit company The New Teacher Project.

I love what I do. Just like students have the “aha” moment in a lesson, new teachers have the “aha” moment in the classroom while you’re coaching. It’s so rewarding to watch someone grow before your eyes.

I left the classroom last year so that I could affect more students by working with teachers. I felt I was only affecting the 20+ students in my class every year and any student teacher assigned to my class. So now that I get to coach teachers, I impact them which means I then impact each of their 20+ students in their classrooms. Now I feel I am really able to share ideas and lessons I have learned along my journey. I didn’t get to where I am by myself, and I own that. I make sure to give credit where credit is due and thats what’s awesome about education- we pay it forward.

These new teachers survived an extremely rigorous program being thrown into a summer school class learning to fly the plane while they build it. It’s not an easy feat. They received lots of support and guidance, but that didn’t make the long days shorter and stress levels any less. But some awesome, steadfast and committed new teachers will now be entering our district in our neediest classrooms to change lives this very month. I couldn’t be happier to be part of such a movement!

I wanted to take the time to shout out two outstanding new teachers who shared their experience at our closing ceremony [see the second post here]. So, I pass the mic over to Kelsey Ripley.

Want to connect with Kelsey? Find her on Facebook (Kelsey Ripley) and Instagram (@kmlamonica).

“PST was not what I expected. Honestly, I don’t know that it was what any of us expected. I didn’t expect to go home and start giving my husband What To Do Directions, or practicing Strong Voice alone in my apartment with my cat. I didn’t expect to be sore from carrying around a ream of paper, waiting for those golden moments when no one was standing at the copier or printer. I now start randomly snapping when I heard something good, even when I’m not at PST. I didn’t expect that. I didn’t expect to be so tired every single day, even after falling asleep at 9:30 the night before. And I didn’t expect that, even when I was so tired from practicing, and snapping, and Strong Voicing, and carrying around heavy reams of paper from building to building – I would still be so excited to be here, with you, and with our students every single day.

I didn’t expect to fall in love with our students so quickly – to have moments of life change within the tiny walls of my classroom. And I didn’t expect to feel such compassion and courage for our students this summer, to invest myself into their successes beyond my short 10 days with them. I want to fight for them in ways I wasn’t ready for – I have put faces to that passion that put me here in the first place, and I didn’t expect the boldness and strength that now fuels me.

And finally, I didn’t expect to walk out of here with this kind of courage and compassion not only for my students, but also for you. For this group of wonderful, excited, stressed, and brave individuals. We have experienced something extraordinary here in the past 7 weeks. We have done the unexpected, and we have done it together. We have shared every emotion, every challenge, and every level of fatigue with each other. We have sympathized with our lack of social lives; our grocery shopping that consists of peanut butter sandwiches and spaghetti; our stress over test scores and our excitement at job offers. We have bonded over our student successes and challenges. And we’ve given each other more “Glows” and “Grows” than we could possibly imagine. The kind of intimacy and friendship I feel in this room today, and that I carry with me into this new season, has broken open my expectations.

And so here’s a bit of batch feedback for us all: Expect the unexpected. Be prepared to walk into your classroom everyday with something different. Be ready for your students to change you, to shape you, to demand more of you. Be flexible. Be willing. Be expectant for change, because your students are worth it. Try something different in every environment you step into in the next few weeks. Be that difference in your hallways, in your workrooms, in your meetings and planning and practicing. Be ready for change, and be ready to be that change.

And so I leave you with that final challenge: Try something different. Expect the unexpected. Teachers, let’s be the unexpected. Congratulations to you all!”

I applaud Kelsey for giving such a moving and personalized speech. It is riddled with inside jokes that made the crowd go wild. That is what great teachers do. They make connections with those they are working with and these relationships are the momentum on which everyone succeeds.

For some clarity, let me explain some of those inside jokes:

• PST is our seven week intensive summer training program called: Pre-Service Training.
• What to Do directions and Strong Voice are Teach Like a Champion teaching techniques created by Doug Lemov that we use as our training foundation.
• The culture we built was supportive in nature to the point where we would snap when someone was talking and said something really great. Its highly addictive and a habit not worth breaking!
• Our summer school program is broken up into two sessions for credit recovery at the high school level, both being 10 day sessions.
• We provide feedback in the form of a “Glow,” something a new teacher did well, and a “Grow,” something a new teacher should improve upon. Sometimes we saw trends with the new teachers and would just give out “batch feedback” meaning not personalized but for everyone- the whole batch!

Beyond these inside jokes, Kelsey nails the life of a new teacher. She highlights the behind- the-scenes life in a way that is encouraging and inspiring. I have to admit that I cried, multiple times, listening to the passion in her voice as she spoke to us all. I so badly wanted to turn back time and be a student in her class this fall. She is going to rock it. She is prepared now to go out and affect our future and i couldn’t be more proud to know her and look forward to all that she will accomplish for our students during her career.

Thank you Kelsey for being the change our students, colleagues, administrators, parents and community need.

What new teacher has blown you away with their drive and compassion? Shout them out and explain why!