Submitting a simple resume for a potential job switch turned into an anxiety-driven, life-changing event.  Should I leave a school where the students REALLY need me to move to a place where the kids have everything?  Will I be able to relate to the students?  How would they relate to me? I even thought, “Am I too Black for them?”

Being true to myself has always been a major part of my inner reflection.  Staying true to myself, I decided to approach the first day of school with an activity that I had done and seen done in many public school classrooms, the “Where I’m From” poem.  In true teacher fashion, I posted a model of my very own “Where I’m from” poem on the Promethean board.  It read like this:

“Where I’m From”

by Javonne Stewart

I am from hoop earrings, from Converse sneakers and baggy jeans.

I am from a hot summer’s night on the stoop in New York and from red South Carolina sand under my bare feet.

I am from both a Big Apple and from a Georgia Peach!

I am from the grape vine that twisted around my grandmother’s fence, the medicinal roots that she grew in her garden.

I am from Sunday dinners filled with fried chicken and macaroni cheese, from my father’s mother’s callaloo and my mother’s mother’s blackberry dumpling.

I am from strong African American women Rosa and her 4 sisters.

From my mother saying, “Don’t ever want what someone else has because you never know what you’re going to get.” And that teacher who called me, “Stupid.”

I am from a strong Baptist upbringing and a small Catholic school. I’m from “The Lord is my Shepherd” and “Walk by faith, not by sight.”

I’m from White Plains, New York where I was born, and Sumter, South Carolina where my mom calls home.

From the rough hands of a mother who worked three jobs; I am from the blood and tears of ancestors who paved the way for my success.

I am from America, from Africa, and from Jamaica all wrapped up in one.

I am from here now making waves so that my sons can know where they are from.

I showed this to them thinking that I knew all there was to know about myself, until that one hand went up and asked about callaloo and the teacher who called me stupid (they could not believe this!); or the kids who didn’t understand that you could attend Catholic school but have a Baptist upbringing.  As I explained these seemingly small representations of me, I realized that I not only had a lot to offer them, but that I would learn from them as well.  Still acclimating to a total new environment, I revel in the fact that I am a part of a community that reminds me, in a positive way, that I have more to learn about myself and that I can still have an impact on the world regardless of the environment.

Learner, Thinker, Writer:  Javonne Stewart serves Trinity School as a Sixth Grade Teacher.