Teachers, sadly, are often undervalued and underappreciated by those they impact every day. In celebration of Teacher's Day 2017, I've decided to give recognition to some of the people who have helped me along this journey called education.

To my Friends U. professors

Thank you for assigning novels, poems, and short stories that I normally would never have picked out on my own, causing me to read something that otherwise wouldn't have made it to my bookshelf. Thank you for encouraging me to think outside of myself and my own situation. Thank you for forcing me to talk in class discussions and challenging me in each assignment. Your encouragement and high expectations have given me a greater confidence in my own abilities, and has caused me to set a higher standard for myself. I will never forget the time that I've had gleaning wisdom from your lectures and discussions.

To my high school teachers

Thank you for bringing the butterfly out of her safe, hidden, antisocial cocoon. Thank you for making me give class presentations (even though I hated them) and providing a safe environment for me to find out what kind of person I was going to be. Thank you for providing me with the launching pad to help me get to where I am today.

To my freshman English teacher: Thank you for your wise advice: "God first, family second, and everything else after that. If your homework doesn't get done, it doesn't get done." Thank you for introducing me to C.S. Lewis and Shakespeare and for encouraging me to continue my obsessive reading habits.

To my creative writing teacher: Thank you for helping me find a hidden talent and love of words. And thanks for giving me extra credit when I wrote 2000 words instead of the assigned 500.

To my art teacher: Thank you for telling me my drawings were really good, when we both knew they really weren't. Thank you for giving me a literal A for effort. Thank you for being a total hippie and showing us how to properly conserve pencils by sharpening them with X-Acto knives. Thank you for allowing us to be creative and have fun in the middle of the school day. Thanks for singing "I Feel Like a Woman" every time it came on the radio. And thanks for playing Underoath that one time I requested it.

To my American Lit teacher: Thanks for calling me your "favorite student in the whole world" and allowing me to be a shameless teacher's pet.

To my mom

It all started with you. Thank you for homeschooling me for nine years. Thank you for not getting too frustrated with me for daydreaming when I was supposed to be studying. Thank you for letting me watch The Price is Right and Little House on the Prairie every day. Thanks for letting me take entire days to work just on my favorite subjects (English, history, and science), yet somehow making sure I learned the other subjects too. Thank you for first planting the seeds of education and cultivating a love of learning in me. Thank you for creating a firm foundation for me to grow on, both spiritually and academically. Most of all, thank you for loving me unconditionally and always cheering me on.

To all you teachers and professors out there, I wish you a very happy Teacher's Day 2017! You are appreciated, and we hope to make you proud.