I am currently a computer teacher for middle school students in the inner city, the City of Brotherly Love, Philadelphia. It is a pretty tough neighborhood with students who experience things at home that I couldn’t even imagine happening when I was a child.
When I began getting my Master’s Degree back in 2005 at Walden University’s online MS in Education program with a focus on Integrating Technology in the classroom (what a mouthful for a degree), I took a course called teacher as a Professional. For the course, we wrote a mission statement and were told to look at it often and reflect upon ways to carry out our mission daily. One way to help teachers reflect is to have positive feedback from others. Therefore, I am posting my mission statement with the hope that I will receive many comments, feedback and suggestions as to how I can live this daily.
Mission Statement of Mrs. Defuria
My mission is to empower students to believe that they can be successful in school and life when they remain focused, persistent, flexible, open-minded, team-oriented, and express themselves creatively. To do this I will practice and model these same habits that I want my students to possess.
I would like my students to remember me as the teacher who listened to them, respected them, understood them, inspired them to think critically, and to work together as a team. Most importantly I want to be the teacher who believed that they could achieve their goals with persistence and determination.
By viewing this mission statement daily, it will remind me to be positive and to encourage my students to make the right choices when they behave in ways that upset or frustrate me.
Viewing that daily would be a real motivator for anyone. I think setting a goal like reading your mission daily is a good way to remind yourself about what is truly important to you. It sounds to me that relationships are of highest priority to you. I will twitter this again and see if you can get some more responses. Pam at http://pamthompson.edublogs.org/ answered my last twitter…Thanks, Pam…Maybe another person will this time…you should get a cluster map on here to see who visits your blog…or at least where they come from…Cluster Maps are cool…
[...] goal that I shared with Janine Defuria, a Walden Colleague, was, “I will utilize wikispaces in each of my classrooms in the coming [...]
Thanks Jeff,
I was hoping to get some more feedback from colleagues on ways to live out my mission daily.
My specific concern is this:
I truly believe in my philosophy, but without supportive parents and administration, living out this mission becomes very difficult to keep sight of.
Do you have any insight or advice as to how I can live out this mission when working in a school that faces so many challenges such as lower-socio economic status, students reading 2-4 levels below grade level, low teacher morale, low teacher attendance, little parental involvement and not enough support from administration?
Another teacher who I worked with this past year suggested finding ways to be a leader for change within the school and trying to influence the administrator to create a team-like atmosphere within the school.
I love your mission statement. I am in a similar school setting and I am going to make a copy of it so that I can remind myself everyday why I am doing this. Teaching computer technology, you have the opportunity to truly help these children feel successful and help their self esteem. I have no doubt with your committment you will accomplish that.
Thanks Shelly,
I have learned that one of the best things we can do as teachers is to practice reflection and introspection. It helps you to figure out where your going and what you want to do with instruction. And I am not talking only emphasizing what we don’t do, but reflecting upon what we do well is beneficial too. Get your blog going as part of reflection. It is cool. We can comment on each others.
Hey J,
That’s a great mission statement. I would like to use it for myself. I know I would also need reminders to look at it and read it often.
Keep it posted.
Hi! I was surfing and found your blog post… nice! I love your blog.
Cheers! Sandra. R.