Lenae Capri Ray

“Once our heart is engaged, it is easy to be brave.”

–Margaret J. Wheatley

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              Every year my students ask me why I became a teacher. They often suggest that perhaps it is because I love children. I quickly correct them and say that it is more about someone who loved me when I was their age. It was someone who valued me, saw me, and showed me what was possible for my life. I was able to read stories about characters that looked like me, I learned how to travel without access to a passport to other worlds and places I never dreamed of, and more importantly, I was motivated to apply to college when no one else in my family had done so before. 

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Education is the gateway to truly understanding who you are and where you determine your mission in life. As an educator, I believe it is my responsibility to present the world to you in its rawest and often in its ugliest form, not with the intention to expose but to bring awareness to the mind of our children to teach them how to be game-changers. It is my job to help students believe that they hold the keys to the change that we so desperately need now and for future generations to come. Education is the tool that will bring change into the hearts and minds of us all. 

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When students can see themselves in the work and literature they are assigned, they can soon see themselves as the hero, the astrologist, the champion, the writer, the mathematician, the artist, and even the college student. 

 

Bravery begins in the classroom for both the teacher and the student.​

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