When my kids were in elementary school, I was an aide until they were in junior high. Then it wasn’t cool. When we moved to Maryland they said, ” Mom, can you please not get a job at our school? So, I worked at an after school and summer program for a year and took a couple early education courses as a back up plan while looking for a full-time job.
I enjoyed my career in another field until my daughter graduated from college. We moved to Texas while she was in the military then moved to California so I could just be grandmas and babysit my grand kids for a few years. They moved and we moved.
After leaving California, I enjoyed substitute teaching for a few years and got an opportunity to teach first-grade a charter school for one school year. Then, Covid hit and I went back to substitute teacher for a semester with 7th graders and enjoyed that.
I loved having my membership at a teacher’s store and don’t want to give it up. Even though I’ve moved on to another job, I still have the heart of a teacher and plan on returning to substitute teaching once I retire. I helped a friend start a non-profit and am focused on fund-raising and am waiting to see the direction life takes that. I want to see my friend’s dream of building a school come true.
I have a Sudanese baby grand-daughter and want to have something to show her when she is older of what we were able to do in her mother’s homeland. I want my friend to have something to shows his boys.
When I started my new job, I still had my entire closet and bedroom filled with teaching supplies I had accumulated the previous year before Covid hit. I donated a lot but kept some items just in case. Once school starts this fall, I will donate the rest so I can walk through my bedroom and get into the closet.
I still plan on collecting backpacks and school supplies and keeping my membership at the teacher’s store. I will still go there on Saturdays. I am inspired every time.
I still have the heart of a teacher. I pray God will supply the funding to make my friend’s dream come true. I pray there will be more to the story and we will have photos to show of happy school children in a new school, filled with all the needed supplies and smiling teachers who can focus on learning instead of survival.
We are so blessed in America. I want my grand children to love school and learning. I want them to have teachers who love being with them. As long as I am able, I will still be involved in some way. Here’s to the future.