What I wish I could say in my Cover Letter

It's January and I still don't have a job. Actually, right now I am long-term subbing, so I can't really interview for anything (and all the jobs are starting...yesterday. Awesome.). But that aside, I have been on a lot of interviews. A lot. And still nothing. In a way I'm not bothered, because that means that the people who haven't called me have felt that I would not be a good fit for them (or them for me). And I guess that means they save me from being miserable at a job where I don't fit. But when will I find the Cinderella Job? The right fit?

You know that moment in movies where the main character stands up in front of a large group of people and delivers a passionate speech (usually in a courtroom... Why are so many main characters being convicted of things)? That's what I want to do. I've been warned against entering an interview room and immediately asserting that I will be their best candidate all day and here's why. And I'm not going to. But I want to. And this is what I would say:

I have wanted to be a teacher since I was in second grade, and I forced the dyslexic boy down the street to learn to read. There was something about this moment -- this sharing of my love for books with somebody else -- that picked me up, shook me, and turned me into a compass pointing due North to my life as a teacher.

It's funny to me that I took so long to answer the question of what to teach. I was a recess reader, a secretive gym class writer, a student who interrupted class once to show the teacher a new story. I was terminally uncool, and I didn't care. The other kids had their makeup and their dances and their premature crushes on twenty-year-old celebrities. I had more. I had anything I wanted. Magic, flight, time travel, talking animals, families similar to mine, families different, worlds both fanciful and futuristic. And what I didn't have within the pages of a book I could create if I wanted it. I lived trapped in another world, but I was anything but a prisoner.

To think that such a job exists that I could share this transcendent joy with someone else -- to teach a student how to find solace in words -- this would be (at the risk of becoming a Disney princess) a dream come true.

In my teaching, I aspire to instill a love of learning in my students -- a drive that makes them into lifelong, voluntary seekers of information, of truth, of beauty. I believe this is possible (though not easy) to do for every one of my students. However, schools today are not set up in a way that is conducive to such inspiration. Large classrooms where the overlooked middle continues to blend and disappear, lesson plans designed around standardized tests, and isolated approaches to things like grammar and vocabulary do not light a fire in students. How can I say this with such certainty? Because I, as a student, was largely a product of such a system -- and I did not have the fire that I value so much today. There were teachers who made a difference -- absolutely -- but always by bucking the system, if ever so slightly. No teacher who recites standards and lives out of a workbook can inspire a student. If you want students who chase after learning, give them something to learn that matters! In my temporary classroom of seventh graders, we are reading The Giver, and every day I love to watch my students fight with their own perceptions of "normal" and "utopia." They are learning. They aren't filling in bubbles, they aren't copying definitions. They are thinking. They are talking. And they are learning.

Can I control a classroom? This is a trick question, as I believe that a true learning community, in a way, can control itself. When students are genuinely pursuing knowledge, chasing that magical spark, hoping to add to their own fire -- it is bound to be chaotic. But I want chaos. I want a discussion that I have to silence because too many students are eager to share their ideas. I want students to love the classroom so much that acting out would be seen as a waste of their precious time. And in what fantasy land would I find such perfect students, I know. Students will need guidance to achieve this level of self-directed learning, but I believe, wholeheartedly, that this is absolutely possible.

I admit that, if you talk to other teacher candidates, you might find someone more experienced than me. Someone who knows how to play the game better, someone who doesn't distribute copies of their cover letter with "Cover Letter" typed in the header. There will be someone more bureaucratic. Someone with kids of their own, who can bring that "seasoned parent" aspect to their discipline. But I promise you, as hard as you look, you will not find somebody who will love what they do as much as me.

Yes, I am young. I am rather small in stature, and occasionally even middle school teachers (when not fully looking) mistake me for a student. But I love this. I love Language. I love writing and reading and teaching and I love working with adolescents. I wish there was a word I could use other than "love," without looking like I discovered a thesaurus for the first time, because I feel redundant. But if I have to be redundant to get my point across, so be it. I have been a temporary teacher for a few weeks, and I practically ache inside to have this life for real.

I know, one day the right school, the right fit, will find me. But you just read my manifesto. Does such a school exist? If so, where? if not, why not?