Taste the Apple

With the ever-looming dilemma of “life after Harvard” at the forefront of many of our minds right now, I would like to draw attention to a profession that rarely gets the consideration it deserves. It is ironic that after spending almost two decades as students, so few of us give a second of thought to teaching. Perhaps not all of us are meant to spend our entire lives presiding over the classroom, but I would argue that everyone who makes it to a premier educational institution like Harvard should at least give it a try. Here are my top ten reasons why:

10. Unleash your creativity: Teaching doesn’t have to fit the stereotype presented in that classic movie of 1986 (anyone? anyone?): “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.” No topic (except perhaps the Hawley-Smoot Tariff Act) can prevent good teachers from constructing lesson plans that pique their students’ curiosity. All-star educators can explain the difference between capitalism and communism with a bag of M&M’s and can start any history lesson with an article from the day’s newspaper. Can you?

9. Put your knowledge to use: A huge problem for many of the nation’s teachers is a lack of sufficient knowledge in their subject of instruction. Even a Rhodes Scholar’s expertise must be coupled with substantial teacher training, but, by the time we complete our intense concentration requirements, most of us at least have the essential subject background needed to teach at the elementary if not the high school level. Don’t let those semesters in History 10b or Math 21a go to waste!

8. Never a dull moment: No matter how brilliant your melt-in-your-mouth economics lesson is, two classes never unfold in exactly the same way. The constantly-changing dynamics within each group of students ensure that you always have to be on your toes, ready to improvise and incorporate a “teachable moment” into your lesson.

7. Improve your people skills: Why is it that so many successful politicians start out as teachers? Probably because teaching forced them to get comfortable working a crowd. Teachers must learn quickly to captivate their audience and minimize the shenanigans of any wise-cracking troublemakers. Concerning the latter, Ruchira Saha, a co-director of the Harvard Program for International Education (HPIE), admits that “you’ve got to grin and bear it—and that really toughens you up as a person.”

6. Share your love of learning: Close to 70 percent of teachers come from the bottom 30 percent of their college graduating classes. We as a student body have the power to change that trend, to lead a new generation of educators who even before teaching were classroom leaders: avid students with a love of learning. Perhaps the drudgery of perpetual problem sets and papers has managed to drive such a passion from our souls, but I think most of us still have that love within us somewhere—otherwise, we probably couldn’t have made it here.

5. Teach to learn and re-learn: In order to design a coherent and engaging curriculum, a teacher must literally take up the role of historian, physicist, etc. Teachers have to reconstruct and expand their own understanding of what they already know in order to convey it to their students. As Orin Gutlerner, director of the Undergraduate Teacher Education Program (UTEP), puts it, “A lot of people perceive K-12 teaching as an intellectually deadening experience, something that’s more about service than scholarship. But nothing could be further from the truth, as long as you approach the work with creativity and curiosity.” At the university level, Harvard College Professor Lino Pertile is in complete agreement: “I teach for myself as much as I teach for my students. I teach because I like learning—because I feel I still have much to learn from my students, my books, and myself.”

4. It’s just plain fun: Catapult-building in physics. In-class reenactments of major battles in history. Jeopardy review sessions for math. You can get paid for all this!

3. It is easy to try: Volunteer weekly during the semester with campus groups like HPIE, HPEP, Civics, or ExperiMentors. Spend your summer working for the Breakthrough Collaborative in the US or with WorldTeach internationally. Experience the real thing post-graduation through the increasing number of exciting alternative certification programs like UTEP, the New Teachers Collaborative, and the Boston Teacher Residency.

2. It is deeply rewarding: Nobody is saying that teaching is easy. In fact, looking after the educational well-being of 25 or more students can be one of the most demanding of tasks. Nevertheless, through all the travails, there consistently come those indescribably gratifying moments that somehow make all the difficulties worth it. In the words of Harvard College Professor James T. Kloppenberg, “Teaching presents daily challenges, but it offers deep joys and rewards, some immediate, some unpredictable, and some that provide an even more lasting if delayed gratification. That ‘aha’ look creeping across a student’s face during lecture or discussion; the comment showing a student has moved into uncharted territory; a fine sentence expressing a fresh idea; a note years later reflecting on something that happened while grappling with a paper—those satisfactions endure after paychecks have been spent.”

1. Education is the practice of freedom: Gutlerner argues that “teaching is social activism in its purest form: advocating for someone else’s success.” Kids in our nation’s schools need strong teachers more than ever. Teaching gives you the opportunity to become a leader, to cultivate every seed into a blossoming flower.

Most of us here have been fortunate enough to sit in the classrooms of some truly gifted maestros. Don’t you think it’s about time we tried a turn at it ourselves?



Henry Seton ’06 is a social studies concentrator in Adams House. His column appears on alternate Thursdays.