Out of school, part 1: Forks
19 April 2008 at 11:16 pm | In Confessions of a Teacher | 30 CommentsTags: challenges, History, Life, Memories, Personal, Philosophy, Thoughts
Over the past months, I constantly felt that my life was headed towards a fork in the road. There was a certain sense of inevitability that a time will come when I have to make the choice of whether I continue on teaching or stop in order to pursue other goals in life.
In the past week I learned that I won’t be pursuing my Masters in Public Policy at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy. I’ll mince no words: I wanted it so bad. I can only speculate exactly why I wasn’t chosen but I won’t. I rather not wallow in the thought that I wasn’t good enough. I’ve been too optimistic, too hopeful and too ready to attend that school to give up on myself now.
There are greater opportunities laying in wait; other doors that remain to be opened. And yet, underneath this facade of calmness and sobriety, those cliches hurt. In a bitter moment, I realized that no matter how high the standards you set for yourself are, the only standards that matter in this world are those others impose upon you. I know that is uncharacteristic for me to say, but I can only pretend to be as strong as I can be.
It has always been my condition that if I don’t make it to Singapore, I stay on and teach in Pisay. That was my fork in the road. And yet, now that I am making the actual choice, I feel less that I took one path over the other and more that I walked straight through the fork, hit the signpost and crashed my head into the sign, reeled back and fell on my ass. I don’t feel like an actual choice was made, but only that I knocked myself silly so that I don’t have to choose. However, I can only bang my head on the sign for so long.
I realize now that the real fork in the road is what I feel at this moment: Do I stay on and teach, or do I carry on to create something else out of myself? It is not a simple question. For the past few days up to the last few minutes, I have contemplated tearing this blog down. I dubbed it “AKOMISMO” during a time when I was most sure of myself; now that I am at a crossroads, I find it tenuous to declare to the whole world that this is who I am. Therefore, this post is an attempt to regain my blog — and myself.
But why am I even thinking of leaving teaching?
I wish I could say that it is all about the money. If it were, we wouldn’t be having these inner debates and I would have left teaching a long time ago — chances are, I wouldn’t even have gone into teaching in the first place. Nonetheless, I admit that times have gotten harder. As I grow older and my responsibilities expand, I’ll begin to talk about security, stability, and the ability to make ends meet for myself. I have yet to become truly self-reliant and the imperative for me to do so has increased over the past year.
Instead, what motivates me from moving on from teaching is teaching itself. I realize that I will always be a teacher no matter where or when I am. It is work I’ve come to love and, to some degree, I feel that it loves me back. I know I can do fine work as a teacher, especially when there is so much more I can do better. I always find ways to constantly challenge myself — and therefore my students — to learn harder and reach farther. I may not always succeed, but it is in trying that we discover that there are no limits to what we can do. Thus, it is because of all these convictions that grew in me over the past four years that I am now at that point where I can take a look at teaching itself and wonder whether there is so much more I can do. And there is.
I am a naturally ambitious man with little respect for the impossible. At the fore of my dreams is the idea of organizing educators of all stripes to rally around civic education. I want to mobilize individuals who share the same passion as I have in teaching our people how to be good and responsible citizens. Similar to how catechists teach religion and tutors teach science, math and language, this group I foresee will reach out to young children to teach them the basics from how to behave in public to how the president of the country gets elected into power. I would like our children to learn about their rights and responsibilities as Filipinos — and when I say learn, I don’t mean memorize, but to live out. To young adults and early professionals, we teach them skills on how to organize and assemble. We can teach them the basics of how a bill becomes a law and how power is shared — and squandered — throughout government. I would like our youth to know, feel and be able to make a difference. And finally, to parents and teachers we share the value of teaching our children history and discussing with them the news. We must emphasize that it is only through learning of where we’ve been that our children will care about where they will be. And when the essence of democracy is communication, parents and teachers must learn how to talk to their kids.
It is this dream, cultivated in my years as a social studies teacher in the Philippine Science High School, that inspires me to go beyond my comfort zone and make my dreams into a reality. For this to happen, I realize that I will need to raise financial capital, establish networks, and equip myself with education and policy tools. To do all these though, I may have to step out of Philippine Science. Attending the Lee Kuan Yew School would have been an enormous step in this direction with its emphasis on policy tools in an Asian context. My knowledge there would augment what I already know as a teacher, thus enabling me to be the change I seek.
But perhaps, there is another Way.
As I write, I realize that the fork in my road is not between teaching and pursuing other goals. The two can possibly coexist in a myriad of ways — I can teach while studying, meet new people whom together with we define our cause and raise support for it. The real fork has become whether I allow myself to be frayed and delayed by a thumbs down from Singapore. The real fork has become about how far I am willing to go to make things happen for me. I believe that there is no lack of opportunity when there is no lack of purpose. The fork now is whether I remain where I am or fully embrace what I am set out to do. For though the world may impose its standards on my life, at the end there will only be one standard that matters and that is whether I chose the life I lived.
AKOMISMO. This is who I am.
When there is a fork in the road, there must be a spoon somewhere.
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“When there is a fork in the road, you just have to get it out of the way and move on.”
—
Sorry, the various caption contests at CFC gave me an itch to give my own caption within the context of the entry. Maybe it’s my lack of sleep, but the “spoon”-thing seemed a non sequitur to me. Not only that, it was also a humorous non sequitur, which kind of ruined the serious mood and tone of the entry. But that’s just me.
Comment by flyingchicken — 20 April 2008 #
Yes, it was meant to be a humurous non sequitur. My way of saying we move on. The spoon is also another image though I don’t expect many to get it. (I expect only one reader of this blog to do so.)
Comment by martinperez — 20 April 2008 #
I hope more people in our country have dreams as ambitious, and as important, as what you have. You can count on me to support you as you realize that dream
Comment by rob — 20 April 2008 #
Thanks, Rob. The best is yet to come.
Comment by martinperez — 20 April 2008 #
Everything happens for the good.
Best wishes in the other Way, Martin.
Comment by frances — 21 April 2008 #
Thanks, Frances.
Comment by martinperez — 21 April 2008 #
Go Sir! I’m sure you’ll be able to find *that* spoon.
“Some dreams are broken so that you will be able to dream bigger dreams.”
Comment by Kamae — 21 April 2008 #
just pursue that road which will lead you to the life that you have imagined for yourself… see life as it should be, not as it is. quoting from what you wrote, “know, feel and be able to make a difference”
Comment by a_former_student_xP — 21 April 2008 #
Thanks guys!
Comment by martinperez — 21 April 2008 #
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Congratulations! What a relief to find teachers like you in these days of economically-motivated overseas migration. Notwithstanding the fact that you had only spent one-third of the 100 schooldays yet (50 minutes each a day, to be exact), you had in one way or another motivated your students to embrace many of your teachings. I hope you would continue to touch more lives. Thank you for being around for our children.
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Kudos to your ideas on civic education for our people. Jose Rizal had those same ideals. It is even more timely now, as we see our Philippine government mired so deeply in corruption that has
made many Filipinos move to other shores. I, too, left for America years ago, because I was outvoted by my 7 sons and wife who all wanted to
experience and live the American Way. But I never let the fire within me that wants to help our native land and people die out. Instead, as my sons have all finished college, except the youngest who is in 2nd year as BS RN student, I have retired from regular employment and plan to come back and start something in the areas of entrepreneurship, health and tourism. I also plan to support the movement for good governance that seeks to encourage people in the moulds of Among Ed, Grace Padaca and Jesse Robredo to throw their hats in the political ring and help rally the people’s support for the people’s candidates.
See you there soon!
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