Teach

January 18, 2025, is the 25th anniversary of my retirement from Education Minnesota.  61 years ago, I started teaching school.  Today I spent part of the morning at the annual “MEA” teacher’s conference at River Centre in St. Paul.  It is an event that attracts me each year, and each year the people around me look younger, and it demonstrates change in other ways.  On the other hand, there is a bit of nostalgia harkening back to my years on the job.

This morning, I arrived in time for the keynote talk by Dr. Micia Mosely (above).  Dr. Mosely, nursing a broken foot, talked to a ballroom packed with classroom teachers.  Her talk was stimulating.  Her organization is the black teachers project, part of the national equity project.

(There is a 12 minute video at the Black Teacher’s Project which gives a very worthwhile introduction, well worth your time.)

I had a particular flashback moment during her presentation when she talked a bit about her background, and as parr of that showed the 5th grade class of which she was a part at PS 205 in New York City, 1983-84, and how the teacher of that class made a small but very profound difference in her life in 5th grade.  The teacher, Ms Arden(?), is in the below picture with that class.  Were she still alive, I highly doubt Ms Arden would remember the incident that so positively impacted on young Micia.  That’s how it goes.  As the saying goes, “Little things mean a lot”.

The picture was striking to me because not too long ago a retired 5th grade teacher friend showed me an almost identical photo of another 5th grade class in the twin cities in 2002-03.

Every conference I go to I consider a success if there is a single insight I pick up.  Usually there are more,  This conference was no exception.

I probably went to my first MEA teacher’s convention in 1965, which is nearing 60 years ago, when I was 25.  Obviously, yesterday I was in a crowd of “youngsters”, probably not much different than we were, then.

Dr. Mosely had us pair up a couple of times to briefly discuss two questions.  My new friend was Michael, probably in his 30s.  The first question “what is the why for the work that you do?“.  In the back and forth he shared that he was born in El Salvador; I from North Dakota.  I asked when he came to the U.S.: “when I was 5”, he said.

The impression made on me by Michael, by Dr. Mosely, and the gathered educators, was pretty profound.

We all start out as kids, impacted in infinite sorts of ways in every year of our existence, growing through crises, and good times, and ordinary times, developing outlooks and skills in infinite ways.

The school community, regardless of where you are, is a place of infinite variety, populated by human beings – students, teachers, all manner of associates as lunchroom cooks, custodians, bus drivers, administrators, and of course, parents and families of all manner.

School is where kids learn to be parts of a community beyond their own homes.

And every class has a Micia Mosley, possibly many more than one, in all of the rich variations of humanity…and this may not manifest for many years.

Those school employees I saw today at MEA in St. Paul are heroes and I thank them.

 

 

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