I thought I would close out this blog after finishing my two-year teaching commitment at the end of May. It's been a great and relaxing summer with Mrs. K, and I'm sitting here getting ready to start packing up and move to a new city and new set of challenges.
I was prompted today to write in my blog because of a recent Onion article attacking Teach for America. A fellow corps member reacted to it on facebook, so I read it and found a few others that they wrote in previous years. I know that the Onion pokes fun to make some laughs, but it's definitely frustrating when they do it at the expense of twisting the truth and defaming one of the nation's best programs, in my opinion.
Since I've been in the program, I've experienced a large undercurrent of antagonism toward TFA that stems from a lot of misinformation, especially from traditionally educated teachers. And I feel like it's only going to bubble over more until people learn more about the program.
For example, this summer I've been helping a TFA alum, who has been serving on the senior leadership team for TFA for the past 12 years, campaign for the school board election in one of the districts in Nashville. One thing her opponents are spreading about her is that she'll fire all the traditional teachers and hire all TFA teachers when she is taking a leave of absence from her position with TFA while running and during her term if elected. Also, the district hires about 500 new teachers each year anyway, and TFA only makes up 100 of them, so TFA doesn't even have the capacity to do that.
In response to the complaints and claims against TFA, this is the way I see it:
Wouldn't it be great if a program like TFA could produce great teachers of whom 100% stay in the classroom and teach as their long-term career or make their commitment much longer? Yes!
Realistic? No. Even though many TFA teachers do remain in the classroom if not a few more years, for their entire career.
Do TFA teachers make an impact in two years? I believe so. The fact is, first year TFA teachers in Nashville outperform all other teachers from any other teaching program out there going by their students' standardized test scores. These are students from the same schools, and that fact doesn't even include the qualitative results that you see from TFA teachers. In my experience, I may not have achieved the same easily quantifiable results with my students, but my students have told me that they see the difference. One of the Onion articles has the fourth grader ask for a "real teacher", but most of my students have said that I was the closest to a "real teacher" they had. A "real teacher" is someone who doesn't give up on their kids no matter what. It is someone who always encourages their students to be their best and reach their potential. It is someone who sees past the surface of the student and sees more inside them than they can see for themselves. Not many teachers in underserved areas do that.
Don't we just need great teachers that stay in the classroom? No. Closing the Achievement Gap and thereby ending the cycle of generational poverty for so many kids requires work from all sectors: education, policy-making, health, business, law, and many others. And this is where the biggest misconception or lack of focus lies I think. TFA is not just a teacher training program, even though it produces as good or better teachers with just 5 weeks of training compared to some with 4 years of traditional training. TFA's mission is to close the achievement gap. Period. And teaching for at least two years working to close that gap in that specific way provides the best opportunity to change the trajectory of kids lives more immediately, but out of that also produces people who will want to devote their careers to ending educational inequity in whatever realm best suits them.
I have a hard time believing that anyone can complete two years of teaching with the sole motivation to pad their resume. It's a tough and thankless profession most of the time. There are probably some people who join TFA for the wrong reasons, and not every corps member is perfect or even stays the whole two years. But to focus on those things to paint such a negative picture just seems pathetic to me. Why not focus on the positive ways that TFA and TFA alums are transforming education across the country and making better opportunities for minority and low income children everywhere through all different sectors?
I joined TFA with the desire to pursue medicine afterward. Teaching was another career interest of mine, and I have wanted to serve those most in need since realizing that I was dead to God but made alive again through Christ. I was open to the possibility of teaching long-term, but I found that my interests and drive from my past experiences were in medicine. I poured everything I had into the kids I taught, and I know that they are better off because of it. After my experience, even though I'm going into medicine, I will continue to work for kids just like the ones I taught by providing better healthcare to them, and I will continue to be involved in closing the achievement gap in various ways.
This summer, I had the opportunity to do just that through working on a campaign for the school board election. I know that if this person is elected, she will lead the board to make the necessary decisions and actions to improve the education for all the students in Nashville. So I went to work canvassing the neighborhoods in the district going door-to-door telling people about her and why they should vote for her. I've probably knocked on over 1000 doors, and if she wins, I know my students will be better for it.
Unfortunately, I won't be able to stay in Nashville in order to continue working with the same people toward closing the achievement gap. I was not admitted to Vanderbilt, so I must go to Athens, GA for medical school at the new medical partnership between the Medical College of Georgia and UGA. I hope I can find similar work in Athens to stay involved in closing the achievement gap there in addition to medicine.
So this is the end of the Making Scientists at the Wood blog. Maybe I'll start a new blog while I'm in med school, or I'll just change this blog. God has been so good to us in Nashville blessing us with such great Christian fellowship and teaching. I've grown so much and I know I still have much more to grow. Please pray for us as we move to a new place in search for a new community of Christ-followers, as we seek to follow and serve Him and shine light in dark places, and especially as my wife and I are living in separate states for a few months while she finishes her requirements for a master's degree.
