Teaching has been my only real career choice (aside from being a princess) since I was 6-years-old. I used to have class with my toys, when my brother and sister were born they were learning the same lessons I was learning in 5th grade while in their real school they were just learning to read and write their names, and all of my playdates consisted of playing school — nothing else interested me in the slightest bit.
Teaching was never about spring and winter break, summers off, or tenure to me... it has always been about teaching people new things and doing something actually productive in this world that a lot of people aren't able to handle.
How many people do you know voluntarily want to listen to 25-30 8-year-olds around flu season? How about voluntarily wanting to teach a group of teenagers how to speak properly when they are learning from the 'rapper of the year' who doesn't use basic vocabulary?
Well, I do. I want all of that — I want to be the teacher that a child is coming home and raving about because I helped them learn long division. I want to be the teacher who makes a 16-year-old see their first A, after being a lifelong D student. I always have, I have literally been preparing for this moment my entire life.
I do not care that you, as a 45-year-old nurse thinks that I should go into your field because "you actually stand a chance at saving someone." I want you to know that I have that chance every single day, because sometimes a teacher is the only person that can save a child with a poor home life and weak support system.
I do not care that you, as a 60-year-old construction foreman believe that your field "actually create things that will be noticed by people," when I want to educate the person who will build the next great building that stands alongside yours. (P.S. I am glad you chose your field because you wouldn't be the person I wanted my child to be learning from with that attitude.)
The only thing that I really believe I have to give this world is my own knowledge. I am not any better than a nurse or a foreman - but I know how to help people understand things and I know how to motivate people to reach their dreams. Also, quite honestly, do you think that you would know the different parts of the body or how to read fractions for measurements if it wasn't for the older versions of myself?
Teaching is everything to me, and I may not be a multi-millionaire when I get where I am going, but I don't need that when I know that someday I will make another person want to be a teacher and pass their knowledge and experiences onto others, like I learned from the amazing teachers in my life.
I want to give students the feeling that they can understand topics they may have never understood before. I want to share new developments and processes with students so that someday they can be the next nurses, doctors, foremen, a president or even stay at home mothers.
No one wants that as badly as I do.
So please, do not tell me the 567 reasons that teaching is an awful career or a less-than goal — because I do not care. You will not change my mind or my goal.
There is nothing else for me.