benefits of MTC

there are many benefits that have come with being a member of the MTC....however, like everyone else, there are a couple that really stick out.

the first i can think of would have to be the humility that has come with teaching. ive never considered myself to be someone who was really full of themselves in the past, but i can definitely say that i was not a modest person and enjoyed the action of tooting my own horn here and there. the first humbling experience was when i first came to oxford for the orientation and when i met all the other participants. granted ole miss isnt a bad university and its honors college was great to me, but i also know it doesnt have that national reputation as an academic powerhouse such as the universities from which the other MTC participants were coming from: princeton, duke, harvard, UNC, etc.....

next was just the experience of teaching in a critical needs school with the kind of students that attend those schools....as i grew up, it was just expected for students to respect their teachers and do mostly whatever they said...however, once i started teaching at wingfield, that all went out the door. never before did what i have to say become so unimportant....when some students will blatantly look you in the eye and tell you to f*** off, you know you have gone through a humbling experience. in addition, just the fact that i was serving a position that was almost completely thankless.

the other benefit from MTC has been my drastic increase in appreciation for MS and its history. growing up, i was dead set on getting out of MS after i graduated high school. after attending ole miss for undergrad and having dr mullins insight from classes and guest speakers, i have really come to appreciate more the history that MS has come from. also, from meeting the other MTC students and hearing about their reactions fo how things "work" in MS, it really showed me how different and somewhat backward MS has been in the past. before, i couldnt really appreciate faulkner's quote:

"to understand the world, you must first understand a place like mississippi"

now after having had classes on the history of education in MS and meeting some of the influential people that have lived through it, i feel like i have a better grasp on the history of my state which has given me a greater appreciation and better idea on what should be done in the future