A moment of clarity...or insanity

I welcome you to my blog, and on this journey with me!

For as long as I can remember, I thought of concepts like blogging, social media, and basically anything that puts your ideas and thoughts on public display to be recreational and somewhat pretentious.  My initial ideas were that Facebook and Instagram were for sharing pictures with your friends and family, twitter was a good way to get yourself in trouble, and blogging was for people who believed their opinions were a bit more significant than they really were! 

It was not until recently, while in the latest step of development in my educational career that I began to see a more significant value for these tools.  Thus, I have decided that I will join the ranks of those blogging individuals at the risk of sounding pretentious and at the risk of saying things that may spark negative comments or remarks.  I have done so for two reasons. 

The first, is that after having read some blogs written by educators and administrators, I realize the tremendous value in reading and sharing in a person's opinions and thought processes.  Even if there were concepts with which I completely disagreed, the act of reading through a discussion and evaluating its value was a worthwhile learning experience.  I am sure that as I begin to share my own ideas, struggles, and successes, there will be plenty of readers (assuming anyone actually bothers to read this...) that disagree with my ideas, process or decisions.  The fact that they read something I wrote and it provoked the thought is in itself valuable.  As I continue to write about my journey from college graduate, into the private sector, and then working my way up from the base of the public education system, I hope that things that I share will be thought provoking, inspiring, or even cathartic for both myself and anyone willing to read through my occasional rambling discourses.

The second reason for starting a blog is for my own personal record.  As teachers, including myself, we can often be guilty of accusing administrators, people working in the government sector, and anyone not on the "front line" of education of being disconnected from what it is like to be an educator.  I am hoping that as I continue to grow as a teacher and a leader, I can save some shred of my thoughts from before I turn completely to "the dark side".  If nothing else, I will likely be able to look back and laugh at the musings of my younger self and smile at the potentially misguided remarks I may yet share.  Hopefully however, this blog will serve as a record to ground me and remind me of the ideas, emotions, and knowledge that I valued at different stages of this journey.

I have started this blog somewhere in the middle of my journey, so over the course of several entries, I hope to revisit the many events that have brought me to this moment of clarity or insanity as I chose to begin sharing my ideas with the anonymous public...

Thank you for reading,

Brian