Today I am guest posting for D.L Mayfield’s blog for her series, War Photography. It is an amazing series, and I am very honored to be posting on a site of a woman as talented as she.

What Teacher Movies Don’t Teach

When I was in college, I borrowed my boyfriend’s car to take myself to the movies on a Tuesday night. I sat in the middle of an empty theatre in Muncie Indiana and wept and cheered for Akeelah and all her spelling glory. I left that theatre inspired. I would be that teacher. I would grow my students to their fullest potential. I would change the world, one student at a time. I could not wait to get into my classroom.

This was not my first foray into the teacher movie. Not only had I seen Dangerous Minds starring Michelle Pfeiffer, when I was 12 I read My Posse Don’t Do Homework, the book the movie was based on. I loved Finding Forrester and Freedom Writer; any movie where the teacher was the hero was a movie I wanted to see.

I suppose I was attracted to these movies because they made me feel special. They made me feel like what I was about to do was important. They promised me that if I wanted it badly enough, if I just dug deep enough, I could be the change I so desperately wanted to see in my future students’ lives. My career would be a teacher movie and I would be the star!

Three months into my first classroom experience, I despised these movies. Every. Single. One.

Want to know why? You can read the rest here.