Upon being named 2018 Sarasota County Teacher of the Year, the recurring question presented to me has been, “What inspires you?”.
My fellow teachers certainly offer inspiration. The long hours and desire to teach lessons in a new way. The creative veracity with which educators make space for students as they learn to navigate the world and allow students to value their own voice.
It is, however, the student that provides me with the most inspiration. The weight of what students carry and how they shoulder it, sometimes gracefully, sometimes with the awkward honesty that the weight is due. The way they continue to show up, day after day and trial after trial. The openness with which students look at the world. How they want, always, for the world to be good. How, despite the protective masks they have learned to wear, they want to see others and to be seen. How they understand vulnerability. How they ask, in ever creative ways, for others to value their voice.
As a community, we must support each student and the teachers who impact their future. We must foster a love and respect for education. Too often education is reduced to a means to an end. Education works better when, as a community, we converse about the value of learning and growing. The importance of skills, yes, but also how these skills are more easily understood and mastered when they are approached with eagerness and curiosity. The student who values education is the student who makes the greatest gains. The student who approaches class with a desire to know is the student who quickly learns the skills needed to navigate an ever more complex world.
College readiness is, in part, an individual prepared with the ability to find the answers even when they are unknown. It’s about understanding the importance of curiosity, discovery, and process. That great epiphanies are not born by simply completing tasks and moving to the next one, but by engaging and applying oneself to the work. Educating is not only about what you know, it is about finding agency and efficacy in your ability to understand how you go about knowing.
Fostering a love of learning is a community effort. It is the belief that engaging in study is worthwhile in and of itself. That through study we grow as individuals.
Let us as a community begin to tell our children that school is a place where we find ourselves and each other. That learning for the sake of learning is a worthwhile enterprise.
Es Swihart teaches at Riverview High School.