It's Just the First Step to World Domination

My story has been told, and frankly, I am getting bored by it, so I can only imagine how the rest of you feel...

My decision to go into teaching is almost entirely political. I had grown up in political activist groups, and after doing some work in environmental justice, I had wanted to go into documentary filmmaking in order to drawn attention to social and environmental issues that plague not only our country, but the world. Yeah, I want to save the world, so what? I am idealistic, but that is tempered by a stark realism about the how this world really works. I got my feet wet in documentary/reality television production, and then took a corporate job during a bout of temporary insanity. I cannot stand capitalism in the way that it works in the US, and working for "the man" really didn't sit well with me. I described the job as "sucking my soul." But of course, working on low or no budget documentaries is a hard way to get by in this world, especially for someone with my expensive tastes. That is a joke. I'm going into teaching, remember?

I thought about environmental law (coincidentally here at LC), but that seemed to be a life of banging my head against a very big, indifferent wall. Maybe a victory here and there could keep me going, but I knew myself better than that. Hmm. I started looking for work in the non-profit sector, and it seemed that the bulk of that work involves grant writing and fundraising. I hate asking people for money, so cross that one off. Then it dawned on me while watching Michael Moore's Sicko. Public education is a big non-profit, and it is more personal and immediate than lawsuits or fundraising campaigns.

Once I had the whole education realization, my past came gurgling up to reveal that I have been on a path to be a teacher for a lot longer than I had previously noticed. I still find it ironic that it took me this long to realize how teaching encompasses nearly everything I need out of a career. Yet, if I had chosen this when I was 22, I don't think I would have been a very good teacher: too impatient, too idealistic, too militant. It took many, many life lessons to show me that you must work for change rather than just demand it.

Of course, going through this MAT program will help me make better and more effective science documentaries for children, which is also part of the plan. And then I'll become attached to someone running for presidential office, who will make me Secretary of Education, and then as 42nd in line to succeed the President, I will assume the Presidency of the Colonies after the Cylons destroy most of the human race. Yup.