Dear 7th Grade Teacher,
If I saw you today, you probably wouldn’t remember me, but I sure remember you. You are one of the teachers that stand out to me in my mind. You don’t stand out as one of my favorite teachers, but instead, stand out as one of the teachers to motivate me the most. Because of you, I push myself everyday to be the best person I can be and to achieve the goals I set for myself. I push to make my dreams come true and to be something in this world. This is mainly because of you. Because one day in the 7th grade, you told me that I would fail in life.
I never forgot what you said. It stays with me everyday, along with the feeling I had after you told me that. I walked down the hall speechless. I told everyone in the school how much I hated you. I did not want to associate with anyone involved with you. I was completely numb. My family was speechless. They vowed to never allow any one of our family or friends to have you as a teacher. I never wanted to speak to you again. And this continued. If I saw you, I would ignore you. You were invisible to me. I could not allow myself to make eye contact with someone who had the ability to be so cruel to someone with no remorse. But those feelings are gone. If I saw you today, I would introduce myself. I would remind you what you said to me, and show you how wrong you were. I would tell you how you hurt me, but motivated me to prove you wrong and made me a better person.
As a teacher, I hope that you learned that what you say to a student sticks with them. There are nicer ways to present a concern that you may have. I hope that you found your ways. I hope you found peace within yourself, which will allow you to treat your students with the respect that they give you.
So I would like to thank you for telling me I would fail because you pushed me to succeed. If you remember me, I hope you can see that and see how wrong you were. My wish is that you never tell another student again that they will fail and not bring anything to the world. I hope no other student ever has to go through what I went through. Instead, I hope that you motivate your students in a positive way. I disliked you for a long time, but I am over that. I do not hold this against you anymore. I just hope you find it in your heart to be a positive impact on children.
Thank you again. Because of you, I have succeeded.
