Celebrating Sophia

After a year of teaching in Virginia, Sophia is now coming back home to Pennsylvania to teach second grade! She will be teaching in Tioga, about an hour north of Williamsport, and I am thrilled! It has been great to have her home during the pandemic to teach remotely, and I am delighted that now she will be only an hour away. Of course, I’m also thrilled that her teaching assignment is second grade. I taught second grade for ten years, and there is nothing better than a second grader!

From the time she first started coming in to visit my second grade classroom (as a second grader) on Bring Your Daughter to Work Day, she knew this was a career path she wanted to follow. It has been wonderful watching her grow into a caring, committed, excellent teacher – always my daughter, but now my colleague, too. My challenge will be to not flood her with advice from my experience teaching second grade. I’ve already asked her if they have a Take Your Mom To Work Day. Too much?

Last night, we celebrated Sophia’s new job with a cake, and a movie – Mr. Holland’s Opus. Phil and I saw it before we had children, and it was very moving, but I found it even more so now. While most of us who teach will never have our life’s work affirmed dramatically by adoring former students in a crowded auditorium, like Mr. Holland did, we teachers know we quietly change lives.

As someone who has mostly loved this job for 32 years, I can tell you, Sophia, that teaching isn’t a sprint. To play the long game, look for the little signs that what you do matters. You have a long, wonderful career ahead, and I am so excited to watch your journey unfold!