9.4.03
Coming to Harvard was actually a difficult decision. I weighed the relative merits of State preparation programs (that were more affordable), private programs, more technical programs, and more reform-oriented programs. Ultimately, I decided that Harvard's Teacher Education Program (TEP) offered a little of everything I was looking for: a relatively small size (73 this year), a tempered slant towards reform, an urban focus, access to a variety of schools for fieldwork, and a great name in the education community. (That last point should not be ignored. The Harvard name does carry some weight when the job search rolls around and helped further justify the higher tuition!)
The Mid-Career Math and Science Program (MCMS) provided other perks, in addition to the financial incentive. As an even smaller cohort (10) within TEP, we have an instant support group spanning a range of interests and backgrounds, having all worked for a number of years in varied professions and disciplines. In my case, I had taught for one year in the middle grades of a boarding school before embarking on a four-year quest involving medical research to determine whether the doctor's life was for me. It wasn't, and ultimately I decided that I missed kids and I missed the classroom. So here I am.
I view this year in graduate school as an opportunity to expose myself to new ideas and practices. I entered the Program in June knowing that I liked teaching middle school, and I wanted to give high school a try. A bonus of MCMS is that it provides me with the coursework and fieldwork that I need to finish in June with a license to teach at both the middle- and high-school levels.
While the Harvard TEP is focused on training us to teach in urban schools, I am here to learn how to teach well in any classroom. However, after participating in the Summer Component and a week of teaching and observing at the Boston high school I'll be working in for the balance of the year, I am pleased that Harvard carries an urban focus. I feel I will have a much healthier understanding of the similarities and differences among schools, whether urban, suburban, rural, public, or private.
During the mornings of the Summer Component, we co-taught in the Cambridge-Harvard Summer Academy (CHSA); and, in the afternoons, we took coursework that related to our teaching. The experience was an excellent crash course/introduction to the Program. As someone who had taught in the past, I welcomed the opportunity to shake off the rust. It also provided an opportunity to become accustomed to being observed while teaching in the classroom - not just by students but also by other Interns and Mentor Teachers. It took some getting used to teaching as a team with four other people; and any fear I had of public speaking had to leave out of necessity within about two days!
The Summer Component also snapped me back into the mindset of being a student. I had taken a Spanish class last spring a) to learn Spanish (I was moderately successful) and b) to get used to being a student again (I was slightly more successful). Having worked for five years, the idea of homework had become thankfully a faint memory. The weeklong, summer courses (meeting 2-3 days at a time periodically over the Summer Component) were about what I had expected. I had been told by friends who had been through the Program that the courses I would love I would wish were longer than a week, whereas I would be a bit more grateful that those courses I didn't particularly like only lasted the week. I ended up liking more courses than not. At the very least, each course offered an overview of a particular aspect of teaching - including classroom management, special education, English language learners, urban education, and adolescent development. Each course (or "module" in Harvard-speak) was akin to a rock band's greatest hits: We got the basics; and, if we wanted more, we were given the resources to explore them independently (i.e., buy the albums).
I am excited finally to be at my school site where I will be for the rest of the year. My Mentor is eager to work with me, which is big relief. We have yet to establish the boundaries of our working relationship, but he's an energetic and diligent guy whom the kids revere. I don't foresee any problems whatsoever. For now, my goal is to get to know the kids better and engrain as many names in my brain as possible (historically not my strong suit). The teaching will come in time.
Other Teacher Journals