Happy New Year!

I survived the first day of my fourth year of teaching. While it's too early to really know many of my students, I remain positive about the impending school year. There are a couple students I know from school years past, but a vast majority of my students are new (to me) minds. I look forward potential readers of literature new and old, expert photojournalists (I'm teaching Yearbook this year), and eager writers of the persuasive persuasion.

A mentor of mine calls me an idealist. I like to call it...alright, idealism, so what? So I arrive at school with a pit in my stomach because my nerves are so bad; so I cross my T's twice and dot my I's thrice; so I come back for more torture year after year. SO, my students are better off for it; SO, I take pride in the work that I do; SO I get results.

A deluge of change has flooded our education system, and educators are keeping their heads just above water. Governor Rick Snyder has divulged his plan to reinvent Michigan's education system. This reinvention has veteran educators admitting that these are changes bigger than they ever thought they'd see. Whether I agree or disagree with this reform, I wont get into. The truth is, I don't know whether I agree or disagree. My hope remains: maybe evaluating teachers based on student growth and awarding merit pay to teachers who are highly proficient are the right things to do. I'm an idealist, remember?

It's a tough job, being a teacher. Tougher still is watching groups of people fold just because they're unwilling to change. I chose my blog name, Walks Like Rain, because it's part of a song lyric to one of my favorite tunes: Drops of Jupiter by Train. To me, the phrase signifies change and growth, renewal and rejuvination. In order to get better, I believe, we have to be willing to make changes, and possibly sacrifice things that are comfortable to us. Possibly, if we all entertain a paradigm shift, we can be the change we want to see in the world. Change is never easy, is it?

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