It's a new school year, which means constantly being bombarded with the same questions over and over again.

"What program are you in?"

"What's your major?"

"What are you here for?"

If I respond with "Education," I usually get funny sideways looks until I finally realized that people thought I was actually answering with "I'm in college to get an education." I guess I just naturally assumed people would know that I'm in a teacher certification program.

So now, I proudly answer the repeating questions with "I'm going to be a math teacher."

My responses are the same almost every time. It's either "Eww math." or "There's no money in that."

"There's no money in that." People tell me, as if that wasn't something I've heard on a daily basis since I was twelve years old and decided that teaching was the career I wanted to pursue. People haven't seemed to figure out that if teachers went into teaching for money, we wouldn't have teachers at all. It's common knowledge that teachers are underpaid. What seems to be less known is that teachers are also very under appreciated. Teachers get blamed for a poor education system when, in reality, they have the least amount of say in what our children are actually taught.

To us, the reasons go much deeper than just a job and a paycheck. To quote Rita Pierson "Every kid needs a champion."

It's about forming relationships with students and knowing you are making a difference.

It's about the way a child's face lights up when they finally grasp a concept they've been struggling with for so long.

It's about the way students start to value themselves when they realize they are cared about.

It's about the way it feels to have a young face excited to see you or tell you a story or just seeing their excitement in general.

It's about the silly things kids do that make for wonderful stories.

It's about seeing the hectic lesson planning and boring meetings and conferences and preparation that leaves teachers so frustrated eventually pay off when students perform well.

It's about the students. It always has been about our students.

I chose to go into teaching because it's the one profession I could think of that would allow me to touch the lives of as many people as possible. Because every single person on the Earth has been affected by a teacher, whether it was in a classroom or just another adult that taught them something. Some of my greatest influences were my school teachers. If you think back on your own childhood you can probably remember really great teachers you had as well as the teachers that weren't so great. I hope to be one of the great ones, as we all do.

My hope is that years from now when people look back on their childhood teachers that I'm one of the ones they remember fondly. While it probably won't be true for everyone, I can still be certain that I'm touching the lives of some people. Even if I only change the life of one person, I've done something right.

So the next time you see a teacher, don't make an off-handed comment about how much money they are making. We are aware it's not enough. We are aware that we put in more time, effort, and sometimes our own money, into something that might not even go well.

I am a teacher. I am an educator. I am making a difference in somebody's life.