Abstract:

Laura Reasoner Jones reflects on a year that brought big changes both personal and professional--a move from a Home Resources special-education pre-school teacher to a position on a project to bring technology to the community.  "Through this change, I have become a leader in my school system; I like
to think that I have stopped hiding in the preschool Block Corner and
have come out to play with others in the Dramatic Play area," she says.

Jones, L.R. (2004). Ms. Jones' wild ride. Teacher Leaders Network diaries. Retrieved from the Teacher Leaders Network 11 Apr 2008. Link: http://www.teacherleaders.org/old_site/diaries04_05/LJ45_04_05.html 

Full Text:

Ms. Jones' Wild Ride

Well, it has been an eventful year in Northern Virginia. I look back over the year of diaries and see patterns and changes that I never might have noticed or remembered without them. And so I review and reflect:

When I began this school year, I was very frustrated in my professional life. I had been trying for a year and a half to get a new job in the technology area, to use what I had learned in my two years at the National Board. So, I killed time during the boring opening-of-school meetings by sending proposals for conference presentations at NECC, the National Educational Computing Conference. And both were accepted, much to my delight and my school system's surprise. The June conference was fantastic. I had great attendance at both of my sessions, and met and talked to many people who will be useful contacts.

I bought a new (used) car to replace the 1994 Ford Escort with 146,000 miles. I went looking for something fun, a "sunroof on wheels," as my wonderful husband described my desire to the salesman. I got the sunroof, but settled for something practical; I am determined to buy more fun next time. Old habits die hard.

I have started to develop incredible partnerships for my Girls in Math/Science efforts. We may be featured on NPR this fall, and we are working to make these kinds of clubs a national effort with the help of several large companies. I will be eternally grateful to Dr. Larry Summers for his opportune comments.

My daughters and wonderful husband are healthy and doing well, Christie in her big new job and Julie with her frequent melanoma biopsies. At home since December, Julie has found her career path, and has grown up immensely. When I speak to parents about encouraging their daughters to take as much math and science as possible, and discuss my GEMS club at conferences, I always dread the question that is almost always asked: "What is your daughter doing now—the one you started the club for?" I hesitate and equivocate by saying, "Well, now that's an interesting story. She was accepted into the Purdue School of Freshman Engineering, but we couldn't afford the out-of state tuition." They nod, and wait. Then I say, "She enrolled in a college that didn't have support for women engineering students and struggled with calculus. Then she thought she might want to be a teacher." They look a little less impressed. And then I say, "So, now, she has made her career choice, and is well on her way to success." Long pause. "She plans be an events manager at a hotel in the Caribbean."

Loud laughter, and probably a little bit of relief. We can't really control our children, no matter how hard we try. It seems to make me more believable, however, and I can get in the comments about how Julie can major in anything she wants, since she has six years of math and five years of science under her belt. It makes for suspenseful conferences, but I am glad she has found her direction.

I have spent many, many hours on my dead people, and have discovered that at least 10 of these ancestors were teachers. Two of them went on to become lawyers, but the others remained 'schoolmasters' or teachers throughout their whole lives. This was news to me and the rest of my family, and I am a little bit thrilled to have carried on the tradition.

The biggest thing that happened is that after I removed every reference to preschool from my resume, I did get a new job in technology, a job that seems to fit me very well. Although not without its struggles, this job has the kinds of challenges that I like, and am trying hard to meet. And I realize that after 30 years, I am really glad to be out of special education. The whole paperwork/tedious regulation part was getting to me more than I knew. The difference between the old job as a preschool special education teacher and my new job managing a technology initiative is like the difference between spinning around on the Mad Hatter's Tea Cups and riding in the front car on Space Mountain: I may die in the dark but at least I am going somewhere.

It has been a year of substantial growth and change. In the fall, as I started the diaries, I offhandedly predicted this painful process of growth and change. And that prediction has come true. I look back and see a great deal of pain mixed in with the pleasures. Health scares, fear of failure, humiliating meetings where my lack of knowledge is revealed to all (I had no idea that the acronym DEA stands for other things besides the Drug Enforcement Administration!) and giving the most technologically disastrous presentation ever happening to one person in one hour at a NBPTS conference. (The tech person helping in the room said at the end, "Are you aware that everything that could possibly have gone wrong went wrong?" Well, duh! I was giving the presentation, remember?) And my wonderful little town is imploding over the issue of new immigrants and expensive social services.

But I also look back and see that I am beginning to resemble a character in one of my frequently used preschool books, and I realize that I could write my own book called, Laura, the Late Bloomer. During the past six months, I have held my own in rapid-fire discussions with corporation presidents about just how poor the families are in my group of schools, invited myself to a reception given by the biggest computer company in the world so that I could discuss (beg for) laptops for our students, agreed to be interviewed on a national radio program about GEMS, called up the nation's second-largest wireless Internet company and begged for free passes, and developed curriculum for our country's most popular museum.

Through these diaries, I have been able to describe and articulate the joys and pressures of teaching a very special group of children and families, a group that is always ignored or overlooked by policymakers and politicians. I have shared my fears and joys about change and growth, and about the difficulties of changing jobs and leaving the classroom/home for an office job: the guilt, the feeling that I "have left undone those things which (I) ought to have done," and the problem of all of the "stuff" that went with my previous life.

And I have tried to remind people that teachers don't live in vacuums. We have families and personal lives and all of the normal distractions that non-teachers have. Finding a balance in life has always been a struggle for good teachers. Most really good teachers short-change their own families to meet the needs of their students; it is the nature of the beast. My new job has been a gift in that area—I spend far less of our family money and much less evening and weekend time on the phone, and I worry much less about individual children. The change has been good for all of us.

Through this change, I have become a leader in my school system; I like to think that I have stopped hiding in the preschool Block Corner and have come out to play with others in the Dramatic Play area. And I rarely "run with scissors" or "become upset when thwarted." But I still firmly believe that every person has something to contribute, and I intend to make the best contribution I can in the time I am given.

It has been Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, and I firmly intend to end up in a better place than he did.

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