Kye and Denise pause for a photo at the Old Spaghetti Factory
Yesterday came and went like a blur. With the 6 hour wait at the airport, the ride home and all the unpacking, it came to me that the Reynolds Institute was over.
This morning, I got up and rode my my bike down toward the ocean, past Golden Gate Park, through the sleepy avenues, to my favorite coffee shop - not Starbucks - surprise.
The fog was at the edge of the horizon, and temperatures were a good 30 degrees cooler than mornings in Phoenix. And we are in a heat-wave by our standards!
I felt like something was missing. I kept myself busy all day, grocery shopping, returning emails, visiting my parents' grave, picking up my wife at work, wedding banquet this evening.
I have this urge to get back to my classroom and start setting up charts, draft letters to the administration, put together rubrics and flowcharts for how the journalism program at our school was going to be run.
In that way, the Institute is not over. The work starts the day we come back. We can start today, tomorrow, or in August after we take a little nice vacation with our loved ones; but all of us will take what we learned and gained and do incredible things with our students and the communities we reach.
Imagine the imprint 35 high school journalism advisers spread throughout the country could have on the future!
And I want to say again how it was such an honor to have the opportunity to attend the Reynolds Institute, to be on the ASU campus, to learn from Steve, Alan and the prestigious team of presenters, to have the support of Diana, Anita, Monique and the other hosts; and of course to share the times with all of my fellows.
Oh snaps!
Now I remember what's keeping me up... We still need to submit our lesson plan! Well, to bed and work on it tomorrow morning!
Posts
What a thoughtful, well-written post. I was thinking, as I read it, what a calming, smiling, thoughtful presence you were at the Institute. Your post would be a great letter to send to the Reynolds foundation to inspire them to fund us for three more years. It was great meeting you.
ReplyDeleteLynn Dulcie
hear hear! Both on the "thoughtful, well-written" part and the "calming, smiling, thoughtful presence" part. Thanks, Eric, for putting in words what we feel. And thanks, Lynn, for saying what I immediately thought after reading this post, too, but saying it better than I was thinking. ;)
ReplyDeleteJuli Stricklan
off to think of a super-de-duper lesson plan, now that Eric's reminded me of it
Once again, I can only echo what everyone else is saying about this once-in-a-lifetime wonderful experience, and thanks, Eric, for the cute picture of Denise and me.
ReplyDeleteI know it all came to such an abrupt whirlwind of an end especially at the airport, but I, too, know that we will be paying it forward through the effect we have on our students for years to come.
Welcome back to Cali!
ReplyDelete