A Warrior's Voice: This is My America

Guest Blogger:  Corporal Chad Reep, United States Marines
                          Facebook Post, 7/18/2015                            
                          Clinton High School, Class of 2005
Email:  creep@vols.utk.edu

Today. Today I am saddened. Today, I hauled around a heart that was heavier than it may have ever been before. Today I woke up confused – confused of my surroundings – confused of the environment I have been living in – confused of the people I encountered. Today is the day I realized that we truly are in peril.

Courtesy of Corporal Chad Reep

When I woke up today, I expected it to be just like any other day – except that it wasn’t. The events that happened the day before stuck with me all through the night, and into the early morning. Four of my brothers died. While I never served with these men while I was in the Marines, they were my brothers. These were men that embarked on the very same journey that I found myself on only ten years ago - a journey that has still to this day been the definition of my life thus far. When I joined the Marines as a naive 19 year-old, I was nowhere close to being the man I already thought I was. That journey, along with the trials that came with it, not only taught me what it was to be a man, but it also taught me what it was to be an American – a proud one at that.

Courtesy of Corporal Chad Reep

That same journey taught me what it was to be honorable – to speak the truth even when it was not popular – to be loyal when being disloyal was so tempting – to have empathy – to give all that I could with no expectation of anything in return – to stand firm in my beliefs no matter how unpopular – and to be able to forgive others for just about anything.

That same journey taught me what it was to be courageous – to accept fear, but to act anyways – to make difficult decisions in a time of need – to be a leader.

That journey taught me what it meant to be committed – to give my whole self to something with all that I have – to see things through until the end no matter how miserable I was. Those who I served with will forever be my brothers and sisters. We share the same blood. We share the same heart.

Courtesy of Corporal Chad Reep

This is not the America I grew up in. This is not the America that allowed me, as a child, to wander as far as I wanted outside of the confines of my parent’s supervision in order to explore the world around me without fear– in order to learn independence – on my own. This is not that America. America, as I knew it back then, no longer exists. We were proud. We were exceptional.

Today, we are in a shameful America – an America full of victims, bottom feeders, and dare I say it, Anti-Americans. We are a reactive America – a sad America. We are an America where criminals get eulogized, and patriots demonized. We are an America where millions of people will change profile pictures to support the breakdown of society as we know it, but won't do the same when four of their protectors are killed by an enemy combatant. We are an America that has created an environment where it is no longer noble or honorable to fight for the very things that make us American. Rather, we are in an America filled with the very people who aim to take away the values and beliefs that have separated us from the rest of the world- the same values and beliefs that have attracted immigrants to this great nation generation after generation.

Courtesy of Corporal Chad Reep

Sadly, the America we now live in is one that educates its children to be anti-American. It’s an America that is now full of college campuses that not only bad mouths the nation that has given them the opportunity to learn any skill they choose and have the opinions they do, but do so with such ease and freedom.

These campuses are the very ones where our veterans find themselves alienated from the very people they have attempted to shield from the true evils of the world while cashing in on the well-earned education that they hoped for after their service was over. These same campuses are the ones full of students, who no longer believe that America is exceptional, but rather it is a plague on the world. To them, America is the problem. In the state we are in right now, can we even call our once-great nation America? Do we deserve to even call these borders that we live within America? In this America we don’t!

The America we live in now is not even America at all. America was not built by whites. America was not built by blacks. America was not built by the Irish, the Chinese, or the Mexicans. America was built by Americans! It was built by us! It was built by people who shared the same image of a free and secure nation, neither of which we see in today’s America.

In my heart, America STILL is exceptional! America still is the freest nation in the world! It is still the only nation where individuals are allowed to travel across borders unmolested. It is still a nation that has endured tragedy after tragedy, while always coming back stronger than ever.  No matter what race, gender, sexual preference that you are, this is still our America. This is MY America. It’s time we start acting accordingly.

Corporal Chad Reep, United States Marines

Corporal Reep will graduate in 2016 with a degree in Political Science

 from the University of Tennessee Knoxville.   

The Reality of Dreams

Guest Blogger: Tyler Morrow
Email and visit Tyler's blog at
http://www.free4thought.blogspot.com/
free4thought@gmail.com

“Each man should frame life so that at some future hour fact and his dreaming meet. “

- Victor Hugo

Some people would argue that success is best measured by the number in their bank account statement while some would counter that it’s more about the number of credentials attached to the end of your name. Maybe it’s my naivety that rejects these measures, but I believe that the only true confirmation of one’s success is in having achieved the dreams and aspirations that are unique to your own soul.  As a recent college graduate, perhaps my lack of experience distorts my opinion, but I think that our culture needs more optimism like mine. In a world where conflict and economic strife are the headlines of the daily news, the only thing that we can hold onto is our hope that things will get better. One of my strongest personal beliefs is that we each have, within us, the power to shape our world and to determine the direction that our lives will take. Call it cliché, but this idea has always been a driving force in my life

As a psychology major at Emory University, I was a research assistant and I studied the development of memory in children. One major bullet point that I retained from that experience was the pivotal role that socialization plays in molding a child’s developing mind. In many ways, the brain of a child is like a molten lava flow; it is vibrant and energetic yet ultimately shaped by the environment through which it flows. For me, as a child raised in the tiny town of Clinton, Tennessee, it would have been easy to accept the idea that my future was restricted to my hometown like so many of my classmates were led to believe. Luckily, though, I was fortunate enough to have a vibrant imagination, a family that encouraged my innate passions, and a few great teachers that taught me that my strongest attributes were my heart and my mind.  

   Much of my own childhood was spent living vicariously through the characters of books that I read, but in the real world, many would say that I was sort of an outsider among my classmates. Understandably, being excluded had a profound effect on me, but not so much in a negative way. Maybe it was my natural disposition, but I believe that it helped to breed in me a desire to work harder.  I learned to read people and understand situations much more quickly than my peers because I was constantly attempting to fit into their socially constructed roles. By the end of high school I had constructed a life of which I could finally be proud, and while I was unaware of it at the time, I now understand that much of that success was due to the self-confidence that came with believing that anything was possible. I have never been afraid to try the improbable, and I suppose my comfort on the road less traveled is one of the aforementioned perks of being a wallflower. So I took that road to Atlanta, GA and attended Emory University.

   Needless to say, sometimes our dreams take us to places that seem more like nightmares upon first glance; I was a small-pond-fish among big-ocean-sharks, and I slowly began to understand the cold realities of our society. Money, which until this point was a foreign language to me, was the ultimate distinction between my classmates and myself: namely I had little and they had lots. While it was difficult without the constant comforts of home, I managed to use my inner strengths to my advantage and make a few good friends while doing well in my classes. Predictably, though, I lost my self-confidence at some point in the chaos, and its disappearance became a near disaster for me. I took a leave of absence from school to find myself again, but it wasn’t easy. My father fell extremely ill during this period of time and the fear of losing him made me question even my deepest held values. Yet the one faint glow in that darkness was that faint optimism left from my youth; the belief that I possessed everything I needed within myself.  So I worked harder than ever and I managed to rekindle my passions. With renewed vigor, I finished my degree and proved to myself that the once clear image of my future was, in fact, attainable all along.

    So what would be my advice for dealing with life’s unpredictability? Well, I always keep some of that “molten lava” from my childhood burning so that when my environment inevitably changes, I am able to mold myself to it without breaking. In all seriousness, sometimes we forget that children possess the hope that many of us so desperately need. We spend a lot of time teaching them the things we want them to know, but I know, for me at least, there is a lot I could learn from my younger self. The biggest challenges in my life have always been and will always be in keeping my dreams alive long enough to attain them and in allowing my life to change without believing that “who I am” has to change with it. 

I Make a Difference

Guest Blogger: Lindsay Kennedy, PHS English/Language Arts teacher
Contact Info. Lindsay.Kennedy@knoxschools.org

WHAT DO TEACHERS MAKE
He says the problem with teachers is
What’s a kid going to learn
from someone who decided his best option in life
was to become a teacher?

Being a young teacher with fewer than five years of experience, I am often asked the age-old question “Why do you teach?”  It’s a thought provoking question. Why did I put myself through five years of college and chalk up twenty-six thousand dollars worth of debt? I think part of me thought I would never be where I am today. Asking an eighteen-year-old to decide what she is going to do for the rest of her life is a huge decision, and these decisions rarely ever play out the way anyone hopes they will. I guess I got lucky, which is why I am here deciding to answer the question, “Why do I teach.”

Trained to be a team player in high school

Truthfully, I ask myself this question every day, rhetorically, of course. For as long as I can remember, I’ve wanted to be a teacher. At first, it was because in my six-year-old mind I loved the idea of being the “boss.” Nothing sounded better than forcing my imaginary students, or real students depending on who I could convince to be yelled at, to do fake homework and fussing at them for refusing to participate. 
As I progressed thru middle school and high school, the fact that I actually LIKED to learn influenced my decision to pursue teaching in college, along with having some pretty amazing teachers along the way. I think the thing that is the most appealing about teaching now is I am still learning. Yes, I attend workshops where we are taught about which methods work best in certain classrooms. I read through articles where research shows method X is most helpful in situation Y with students 1, 2, and 3. I sit through lectures where I’m told that evaluations count for 50% of my total score, 35% comes from my students’ test scores, and 15% comes from different aspects of professionalism.

I make kids work harder than they ever thought they could.
I can make a C+ feel like a Congressional Medal of Honor
and an A-­‐ feel like a slap in the face.
How dare you waste my time
with anything less than your very best.
I make kids sit through 40 minutes of study hall
in absolute silence. No, you may not work in groups.
No, you may not ask a question.
Why won’t I let you go to the bathroom?
Because you’re bored.

However, learning doesn’t always have to do with facts found in textbooks or this week’s best research-based practice article. Every day we as teachers are given the opportunity to learn about our students. Situations always present opportunities to get to know students a little better every day. Without this, the chances drop of having a successful classroom. But, the effort has to be made in order for this learning to take place. I wouldn’t know that quiet girl in the second row who played the flute in the marching band without going to the game on Friday night. I also wouldn’t know my class clown scored a touchdown, or that over half my class enjoys standing on the bleachers to watch a basketball game. 

New team, but always a team player

I love being able to strike up a conversation with my students because we share common ground. Eventually, struggles at home, requests for extra help emerge from the students who have seen me as something more than just a classroom teacher. Just when the progress has begun, the semester ends and I start all over with a new class. Once again, I’m faced with my own new learning because I barely recognize any of the new names on my roster. When the new students start to pile into my room,  my anxiety begins to recede because I recognize faces. I know that kid from watching the band.  I saw that kid sing in the Christmas program.  Those kids were at a few of the basketball games. It doesn't take long to earn their respect and trust simply because they recognize me. They all seem to "know" me from our common ground.

And you don’t really have to go to the bathroom, do you?

I make parents tremble in fear when I call home:

Hi. This is Mr. Mali. I hope I haven’t called at a bad time,

I just wanted to talk to you about something your son said today.

To the biggest bully in the grade, he said,

“Leave the kid alone. I still cry sometimes, don’t you?

It’s no big deal.”

And that was noblest act of courage I have ever seen.

I make parents see their children for who they are

and what they can be. 

This is learning at its best every day.  It’s simply taking the time to learn about the students who belong to me. It makes for a much better classroom atmosphere, better lessons, fewer discipline referrals, and lifetime connections. It allows a kid to know his teacher cares about him.

My Graduation card to my all of Seniors

 All in all, this is why I teach. I do it for the kids, the things they can teach me about other kids, life lessons, and as selfish as this sounds, I do it for what they can teach me about myself. Education isn’t life-long learning about core subjects. It’s life-long learning about life. All of that other stuff just fills in the gaps.

Here, let me break it down for you, so you know what I say is true:
Teachers make a difference! Now what about you?

~Taylor Mali, "What Teachers Make" 

Poem excerpt from:

 Mali. Taylor. “What Teachers Make.” What Learning Leaves. Newtown, CT: Hanover Press, 2002. Print. (ISBN: 1-­‐887012-­‐17-­‐6)