In the Beginning
Prior to taking my most recent courses within the Master of Arts in Education (MAED) program , I completed my student teaching after completing my undergraduate degree in Teacher Education with a history major. Within that program, and with student teaching, I finished two semesters worth of credits towards my Masters of Education degree. The big goal was always to finish it, but finding my first teaching job and getting my career underway was what came first. I had an interview at a school two days before the school year was slated to start and, knowing it was that or nothing, I accepted when I was offered. I knew that pairing my first job with finishing my own schooling would be difficult so I decided to wait until the winter semester to try to re-enroll and finish up my degree. I had all intentions of doing this, but that job and the environment I was in sucked the life out of me. I decided waiting until I was in a better place was probably for the best, so I did not go back in the winter of 2019. I was able to get a different job the next summer and began looking at options and opportunities to go back and finish up my degree...
and then COVID hit.
I waited a while to begin looking at online options to take and in 2022, I got back into the program. I needed to re-evaluate my initial goals that I had set before student teaching began in 2017, a lot of time had passed and I had new experiences that shaped and changed my thoughts.
Initial Goals
When I set out in the program my goals primarily revolved around getting better in the nuances and the art of teaching. I wanted to be able to better take my own ideas for how to teach and apply them to help my students. I figured that the course load within my 800-level Teachers Education classes would help me to attain this and to grow as a young teacher; being able to take what I was learning on campus into a classroom that was "my own" would further my academic opportunity. This goal did not feel lofty enough though so I was always looking for other opportunities to inspire myself, but only getting one year into the program, I did not have the time to grow this or alter it much. When I decided to come back to Michigan State, my professional arc had changed from wanting to be a career teacher to being an Athletic Director in my district and I wanted to align my academic program to these new goals. When I set back out last winter, my goals for the program were to marry the skills I already had in the classroom to new leadership skills I would learn through higher level classes, and then to get better and learn more about leadership within the athletic realm and have something to show for the time I have been putting in. To achieve this I took more leadership-based classes and have applied myself to more theory-based approaches.
Progress?
I am due to graduate after this semester (spring 2024) and I have taken the requisite leadership courses to fulfill my degree. I feel that I have made great progress in achieving the leadership-based academic goals I have set for myself within this program and this shows through what I have been doing in my professional life; I am coaching three sports, lead two class trips, and am the youngest department chair in my building. I would not have this professional achievement if not for the ideas and theories I have learned through my classes in this program.
So... what's changed?
Everything, and yet very little. The goal within the program was always to take what I have learned in my classes to apply to my career, but when my career path changed, so did my academic goals within the MAED program. I wanted to become better in the art of teaching using things I learned in my 800-level classes, but when I realized that I wanted to be a leader in a different role, my program goals changed to reflect that. Now that I can see the finish line, I would like to think that I have made great headway in saying that I have completed both of my program goals.