Good morning my name is Mimi young and I'm in teacher education. I think one
thing that distinguishes me from maybe some of my colleagues here is that I do
have some experience in teaching prior to my experiences here at UNT and so
this story kind of goes way back into one of my very first years as a teacher
and it's really talking about the humility and humanity and what we do as
educators. So I remember my very first year teaching I had a young lady in my
class who wasn't physically in my class. This was a high school classroom and so
we have what we call homebound students these are students that for one reason
or another may be pregnancy or illness or some kind of physical limitation
might prevent them from physically being in class and so they work through what's
called a homebound teacher we send work home to the homebound teacher they give
it to the student student sends it back to the homebound teacher and then we get
it there again. And so oftentimes you don't meet these students. Well this
particular student I did have an opportunity to meet and she came to my
classroom one day after school and we really hit it off. Her and I found a lot
of common ground. I was young I started teaching when I was 19 years old and, so
long story short, we just really had a positive rapport. I didn't know it at the
time, but I'll call her Nikki, but Nikki had cancer and so I didn't ever really
talk with her about it we continue to see each other after school sometimes
she would be sick and so she wouldn't come for a few weeks wasn't abnormal. And
she even came to class one day and did a presentation for a group project that
they had to work on so her classmates got to meet her. It was just a really
good relationship that we had. One day she comes to me after school and she
brings, and she told me she's gonna bring this, she's gonna bring her scrapbook.
Well this is a 15 - 16 year old girl what do you think 15 - 16 year old girls are
scrapbooking about? Boys? College? Weddings? This was a scrapbook of
her funeral. And so we're flipping through the pages and I am at a loss for
words. Her casket is picked out. Her dress is
picked out. The hem she wants sewed is picked out and... I have no words. And after
we look at this she looks at me and she says, "I've never connected with anyone
more in my life. Promise me you'll come to my funeral."
And being a good teacher because you learn these little teacher skills.
Right? I had a good comeback. I said, "You know, no I'm not gonna come to your
funeral. You're gonna come to my funeral cuz you're gonna outlive me." And she's
like, "No, no, no, miss seriously, promise me that you'll come to my funeral." And so, I
did, I promised her and a couple weeks pass, again not uncommon for me not to
see her, but then a couple more weeks pass. And so I call home no one answers.
Call her homebound teacher no one responds and so I finally call her
secondary number which is her aunts number. And her aunt calls me back and
tells me that about three weeks after we had had that encounter that Nicky had
passed away. And so in that moment there were so many emotions. I couldn't think. I
couldn't breathe. I couldn't teach. And it really made me think about why I do the
things I do. What we do as educators is beyond the curriculum. It's beyond the
pedagogy. It's beyond the in the day-to-day interactions with our
students. So fast word to here at UNT I sometimes tell this story to my students
at the end of the semester. And one particular instance, a few semesters ago
when I was telling this story, a student comes after class and she tells me
she said, "I wasn't going to tell you this but Nicky was my cousin and you are the
reason why here and you're the reason why I want to
be a teacher." And so when I think about teaching and what I do for my students
it's beyond what we do here at UNT. It's beyond our coursework. It's so that they
can be good citizens. So that they can be productive members of society and we
feed into them we give to them so that they can have a more profound impact on
the future. And so that's my story of humility and humanity and what we do as
educators. Thank you.
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