AGAPE

I'm not sure if I agree with that. Spirituality means too many things to too many people to be able to say that it's the missing piece in the puzzle of education. I'd rather elevate an idea entwined with morality and ethics to foster more high-minded discussions of purpose and mission. I think that those arenas foster more careful consideration and deep thought, as well as welcome debate and theorizing. Spirituality is a term that can be alienating to some, and easily dismissed by others; while it can mean many things, and doesn't deserve this sort of dismissal, it still has the potential to be an alienating term.

I entered the teaching profession because I love to work with literature. While I may someday move to the collegiate arena, it doesn't immediately entice me because I like working with the energy and potential of high school students. I also love coaching basketball, and that's a difficult thing to do on the collegiate level - oftentimes, one must make it his/her profession above all else, and I'm not willing to lead that sort of nomadic life. I was inspired by many teachers, as well as college professors, and even coaches in my past - namely a dude named Jason Allrich! He was a coach for my JV team, but he also played bball against me since I was a 7th grader and he was in college, and helped me become a player that is unwilling to step down from a challenge and plays hard all of the time - willing to outwork others (since I'm small and not that great of a jumper!). On the English side, I enjoyed working with my high school English teacher, Leah Burke, who I later was able to long-term substitute teach for while she took maternity leave. There are many others in these figures' wakes, but they were major players.

It's too hard to tell whether this is a golden age of education since we're living it, but there are many reasons to be enthused and discouraged about education, depending upon where one teaches. Some students have unparalleled access to information and technology and are complaining about it; some don't have access but yearn for it; some have myriad opportunities, and some are defined by their social stature. It's a frustrating, complex, potentially grandiose, crazy time to be a teacher of children. I think that opportunity is ultimately at an all-time high for students due to the large-scale adoption of technology and social programs, but we are nowhere near perfect as a society, educationally - to be great, we need social programs to be expanded (namely with regard to poverty), and such things, but most of all, we as a society need to VALUE EDUCATION FOR THE PURPOSE OF KNOWLEDGE / EDUCATION and not as a MEANS TO AN END; this shift in perception is not likely, and altruistic, but a needed shift to truly be living in a golden age of education.

With regard to spirituality, see the first paragraph for my thoughts. I'd like to elevate the concept of "A whole school for the whole child," but I don't currently wield that kind of power; thus, I'd like to elevate the concept of modeling behavior, as that's something I try to do and can also control.