Seems to me these people have stepped it up even more during the past few years :)
"The past few weeks have had some interesting 'eye-opening' moments, especially related to those special people who inspire me as a teacher. Often the people who inspire us are people who are older, experienced, and have done/created/initiated some really great things in their lives and careers. There are many of these people in my life, however I have begun to notice that the people, who once looked up to me for the things I have accomplished, have stepped out into the world and are doing some pretty phenomenal things!
One of my friends who was in a class that I was a teacher's assistant for some four years ago, is now an athletic director at the college I work at. I remember his essays being well done and him putting a lot of effort into his assignments. Like most students, the rest of his university career came and went with the usual happenings. This past year, he became the youngest athletics director in all of Canada. He has taken a stale athletics program and brought energy, youthfulness, a positive rapport, and more importantly, change, into it. He has taken a program that has focused primarily on athletics and worked to create academic coaches for each team. Although in its first year, the foundation is set for this to be an extremely effective partnership that will work to the benefit of the athletes, coaches, and school. He has also taken the steps to create community relationships for teams to start integrating themselves into local schools and organizations. So much positive change has occurred- all because of the passion of a young professional who took a program and created a vision for it!
One of the most inspiring people at the moment is completely responsible for my twitter/blog/igoogle education. Although I am in the very beginning stages of understanding social networking, this person has taken the relatively untapped resource of networking in PE and found his niche. He has managed to create his own website (www.thephysicaleducator.com), integrate twitter, linkedin, blogspot, delicious, igoogle, googlewave, and a few other networks that escape me in order to bring physical educators together in cyberspace. I am amazed at how much he has learned about social networking in the last 6 months- so much so that he will be starting a master's degree on in it the fall! I have to say that every time I meet with him, I leave our conversations filled to the brim with how bright the future in physical education is. I feel inspired and ready to make positive changes and advances...all because one person has PASSION for PE!
It is amazing how much of a difference it makes to work with colleagues who share a similar passion and vision for physical education. A new colleague that started at the college in the fall semester has put a little pep (and the color pink!) in our department. When I first started at the college, I felt like a dorky keener who wanted to change the world and bring fun, excitement, and my Krista-style of teaching into our office. Being the youngest and newest, it was a bit intimidating, especially since many of the other teachers didn't necessarily have the same energy and zest as I did. When my colleague came in, I thought 'wow, this is someone that is more hyper than I am!'. It is amazing to see what two hyper people can do to the overall morale and passion of a department. I can honestly say that our department has become closer knit and in turn, has brought a new energy into the classes!
Finally, my last inspiration occurred this morning when I was on my way to work on the metro. I ran into a student who I taught at the high school and then again at the college. This is a somewhat quiet student who I used to let come into my weight training classes to train even when he wasn't in the class! We got to talking and reminiscing about some of the crazy PE teachers at the high school, when he said, 'guess what?'. Funny, I was just about to ask him what he was going to study at university in the fall, when he went on to say that he had just been accepted into the physical education program at McGill. He said that he originally wanted to go into business, but that he wanted to follow his passion for physical activity and do something education-related. It was exciting to see one of my former students excited about teaching PE!!!
I guess to sum up, we as individuals are only as great as the people around us! Thank you to all of you who inspire me everyday!"
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