The Joy of Education

I am going to veer slightly off the path for this blog post.  I coach my daughter’s 5^th and 6^th grade girls “in-house” basketball team operated by the PTBA.  There are 8 teams in our league each with 10 players.  Our season is coming to an end this week and I want to share an experience that I had with the team last Saturday.

Our team is filled with great girls.  All of them are pleasant, respectful and a blast to be around. I have enjoyed myself immensely.  The girls have shown incredible improvement throughout the year and have been receptive to coaching both during practices and games.  Despite a lot of improvement, our record going into the game on Saturday was 1-7.  We won our first game in a shoot-out by the score of 2-1.  We then lost 7 straight games.  There were stretches of great play during those 7 loses, but never enough to get a win.  This brings us to Saturday.  The girls were pumped up, ready to play and excited.  The game was a close one from the start.  No team ever had a lead of more than 3 points.  With under two minutes left our team made a foul shot to make the score 9-6.  On their very next possession our opponent scored a basket to bring the score to 9-8.  The next minute and a half of play consisted of both teams with many possessions, missed shots, fouls and other excitement.  When the buzzer finally went off (it seemed to me to take about 10 hours!) the girls had won their second game.  The joy and excitement on their faces still brings a smile to my face!

Later on that night as I watched the end of the San Francisco and New Orleans NFL playoff game, I watched the reaction of the players and fans as San Francisco won in the last seconds of the game.  Reflecting on their reactions I knew that no one in San Francisco was happier with their win as our girls were with their win.  Education is about putting students in situations where they can succeed.  Our job as educators is not to assure they win, but to assure they have every opportunity to succeed.  This can be done on the sports field or in the classroom.  All of us as educators have experienced the joy of watching a student beam with pride because they just figured out a problem or did well on a test.  This is what education is about!