Connections.

I started a new grad class last night and am so incredibly excited to have a professor who is thoughtful, knowledgeable, and organized. I can tell just by the first meeting that this class will be challenging, encouraging, and awakening for me.

As it was the first night, there was much talking and paperwork to attend to, and of course, the traditional first class "icebreaker". As we did our partner interviews and presented, it was quite amazing to see the connections between our small class of 11.

For example, I run marathons, so has another classmate who ran one for TNT which supports cancer research, another classmate is a cancer survivor. Then, a classmate said that she attended Barton College, not only is Barton my middle name, but I have a friend who attended Barton College (which is a very small college...). Next to find that a classmate has been on safari to Kenya, as I have been on Safari to Kenya. While these might seem silly and not so unique, they make lovely points of connections.

The most interesting connection between almost all of us is our greatest source of pride. All but two of us cited moving away from home and living away from friends and family to establish our independence as a proud moment. (The other two, cited their families as their source of pride) I find this fascinating as I believe that our life's travels are what give us the greatest education we could find.

Our class topic is change. We will study and apply change processes within the realm of school reform. I certainly think that our wealth of connections to each other and the world around us will bring great discussion and insight as we tackle the issues of change in our educational settings.

After a disappointed start to my journey in graduate education, I'm so pleased to have finally found a place amongst those eager to learn and eager to teach!