Today, on the 78th anniversary of my grandmother's birth, I would like to honor Jo Ann Goolsby, one of the more amazing teachers I have ever known.
Grandma spent the first part of her life as the CEO of her household. Once her three children were older, she went back to school and earned a masters degree in education. She started and finished her career at Sam Houston High School (Go Texans!), teaching first Junior then Senior English.
Grandma was old school. She didn't smile the first two weeks of school. She didn't "give" passing grades to star athletes (a practice that caused the administration to place several with other teachers). She wrote on a chalkboard ... with actual chalk.
Despite her cold manner at the beginning of the year, Grandma left a lasting effect on her students with her warm personality and caring attitude. There are people alive today who will tell you she was one of the best teachers they ever had. When her Christmas tree died right before the holiday, leaving her with a barren tree and a carpet full of needles, her students bought her a foot-high glass tree with tiny, light-up ornaments. (She plugged that little tree in every year after that, and it sat prominently on a living room table.) She went to as many SHHS football games as she could to support her students. When she passed away, one of her attendants was a student. Every year in May, a group of ex-teachers who worked with her gather to choose a recipient of a scholarship established in her memory. They talk, they laugh, they miss Jo Ann.
Grandma retired in 1991 when she was diagnosed with cancer. Her death less than a year later left a large hole in the lives of many, many people. Even today, as I sit in my own classroom, planning my own lessons, I wish I could call and ask her for her opinion, her feedback, her support. I imagine my journey to find my teaching comfort zone would've been different if I had had her to lean on.
But then again, maybe I always did.
Beautiful.
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