My Teaching Philosophy

My goal is to set up my classroom so that equity and affirmation are for everyone. However, I will inevitably have students to whom whether my classroom is an affirming space profoundly impacts their mental and emotional health as well as their safety. Equity and affirmation are vitally important both to these students and to me as a teacher. Feeling like you do not receive the same respect as your peers based on some part of who you are that you cannot change is an awful experience. I would not wish this experience on anybody, but it is something that most people will go through at some point in their lives. I want to do everything in my power to make sure my students never have this experience in my classroom, and I want the community I establish with my students to be a source of comfort if and when my students have these experiences in other aspects of their lives.