In a few days’ time, I will have put the finishing touches on what is my twenty-eighth year of teaching at the high school level. For someone who never wanted to become a teacher, it’s remarkable that I have stuck with it for so long. I guess, eventually, I arrived at the point of no return, at around the ten-year mark, and so here I am, winding down another school year. 

This year was different, though. This one was made special by the type of student that came under my care. As teachers, we never know who we’re getting, and as the year moves along, students come and go, altering the classroom dynamics, for better and sometimes for worse. Fortunately, I had a fantastic year, one of the most memorable in a long time, and I attribute it all to my best class!  

This year, my day began by teaching seniors, which is a massive shift from the sophomores that I teach on a full-time basis. The sophomores arrived after the seniors moved onto second period. The seniors were enrolled in my English class, but it wasn’t a normal, high school English Class. This one was my English 1A/1B course that I taught via the Dual Enrollment Program Alisal High School provides ran in conjunction with Hartnell College. I was blessed to begin each day with these kids. They were mature, intelligent, curious, and they wanted to be there. As the year went on, I got to know them more and more. We had fantastic conversations on an array of topics, ranging from traffic tickets to the death. I, again, was an actual teacher. My teacher mojo returned, and I transformed from a baby-sitter to a professor, once more. I even felt like a teacher, more so than I have in a long time. If I’m being honest, it took some time to readjust to teaching the subject I love, but I found my footing and developed momentum and stability. 

I read four novels to them. When I say, “I read,” I do mean that I read directly to them as they followed along with their own novels. When I asked if someone wanted to read besides me, they emphatically said, “No!” They wanted me to read to them. So we read Frankenstein, Siddhartha, Catcher in the Rye, and Jane Eyre (not finished). We also read short stories, such as “Greasy Lake,” “The Old Man with Enormous Wings,” and “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been.” We wrote a lot, as well, and it was through their writing that I was allowed the sacred privilege of peeking into their souls a little, to see and feel their sorrows, their joys, their angst, and their love. Every single one of them was and is going through something, whether it is family related, friend related, health related, trauma related. The list is lengthy. I do not take these opportunities for granted. Instead, I rejoice in how privileged I am to have gained their trust in opening up to me, just as I opened up to them. In the span of about 180 days, we experienced a lot together. We broke bread many times, before the school shut me down and said I could no longer cook for my students. We celebrated Edgar Gomez. He was one of us. He was our guy, and we lost him to a fatal act of violence. But we celebrated Edgar. We broke bread in his honor. We cried together and we laughed together. This is how it was. The year is ending, and I may never see them again for as long as I live, but I got to experience them, and this is a good thing. As Dr. Seuss once wrote, “Don’t cry because it’s over. Smile because it happened.”

Good luck, my friends! I will miss you. You gave me something to look forward to every day, and I am forever grateful. Now go and do big things!

Love, 

C