Choose to Teach - August 2023

This is my 21st year teaching so I've been teaching for quite a while and I'm loving it. I chose to become a music teacher because I really enjoyed music making but most importantly I enjoyed seeing the students faces when they were able to play a passage for the first time that they were working on for such a long time, and that little bit of excitement and that look in their face when they're able to achieve something that they thought was not attainable. It was like a drug to me. I mean I just needed to see it more and so it's really about the students faces and their accomplishments when they get to play music.

The person that really inspired me to become a music educator was my band director. He had a lot of faith in my progress. He gave me a lot of opportunities and he always believed in me and celebrated my accomplishments regardless of how small they were. I remember there was one year where we were just doing all-state competition and he said, wow you're really surprised so many people and you're just a sophomore. We can't wait to see what you accomplished after that. And so just having all those celebrations and seeing my band director just work so hard, not just for me but for everybody in the program and being able to reach out to the community. You know he really inspired me to become the teacher that he is. Like he is and he's still teaching now so he's somebody that I aspire to, so shout out to Mr. Molina from Kingsville, Texas. Yeah.