Hello friends, family, and strangers (I flatter myself)! I am a recently-graduated girl finding my way in the "real world" (apparently, I've been floating around the fake world for the past two decades). Many of my friends' "real world"s consist of cubicles, nine-to-fives, marriage, babies, and other such grown-up things. My real world looks a little different. Yes, I still get up and go to work every morning, same as they do. But instead of battling fax machines, computer programs, disgruntled spouses and dirty diapers, I arm myself against a legion of 14-year-old boys. Well, 83 of them to be exact. You see, I teach 8th-grade boys' Science in an inner-city, high-poverty school. What it is not: glamorous, prestigious, boring. What it is: humorous, heartbreaking, and the most challenging thing I will ever do.

The stories I tell and the people I describe are real; you can't make this stuff up. If you are new to my blog, I hope you'll start at the beginning and fall in love with its characters, just as I have.

Sunday, August 8, 2010

Today I found out that while I was out of the country, one of my students was shot and killed.

He was one of my oldest students because he repeated 8th grade, but that still only made him fifteen. He was always getting in trouble, always trying to make people laugh. He'd curse at me one day then hug me the next and ask to help me move desks. I tried to be patient with him, but I wasn't a lot of the time.

I wish I could go back and hug him.

Tell him how much I admired him for being so resilient.

Tell him he didn't need to impress anyone. That he wasn't dumb because he failed 8th grade. That I thought he had a kind heart. That I cared about him.

But these words and gestures seem trivial now.

So I read his obituary and cry.
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2 comments:

  1. Lindsey SmithAugust 9, 2010 at 6:07 AM

    kiley, i am so sorry. i know this has to be incredibly hard for you. it makes me cry just reading this because you have made me feel like i know these kids.

    even though this is incredibly painful, you are there making a difference! you are there changing situations like this and outcomes like this. you know that you have already changed these students lives and everyday are working to make sure there are more positive outcomes in their lives! you are doing great!!! keep at it!!!!

    I LOVE YOUUUUUUUUUU

    ReplyDelete
  2. Sara WalkerAugust 13, 2010 at 1:17 PM

    Aww!

    ReplyDelete

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