I was born in St. Lucia on January 23, 1915. My parents, who were both school teachers, had immigrated there from Antigua about a dozen years before.
We run courses for government school teachers on Sundays. These teachers pay for their own food and stay; the kind of commitment you find in these people is remarkable.
I was a nursery school teacher, and I worked with youth groups. I loved that job. It was exhausting, but you got a lot back - all their purity and insight and innocence is so on the surface, and they're so unrepressed; they'd really scream at you and then give you a massive kiss.
I'm a school teacher, and later on, well past my formal education, I became very interested in science.
As a former high school teacher and a student in a class of 60 urchins at St. Brigid's grammar school, I know that education is all about discipline and motivation. Disadvantaged students need extra attention, a stable school environment, and enough teacher creativity to stimulate their imaginations. Those things are not expensive.
If I wasn't serving in Congress, I've always wanted to be a high school teacher. Specifically, I want to teach a course on modern American history and use Garry Trudeau's Doonesbury as a primary text.
We need to make sure we have in every school teachers trained and qualified to make sure every child, including children with different learning styles, succeed.
My dad worked for a generator company and then UC Berkeley, and my mom was as a dental hygienist and then eventually a history teacher. My uncles and aunts, all of them are elementary school teachers or scientists.
My humanitarian work evolved from being with my family. My mom, my dad, they really set a great example for giving back. My mom was a nurse, my dad was a school teacher. But my mom did a lot of things for geriatrics and elderly people. She would do home visits for free.
Within a single school, teachers often encounter differences in poverty levels, parent involvement, and student readiness.
