Nate Terronez: What Brings Me to Teaching

               Becoming a teacher was not my first career choice. Originally, I wanted to be an architect or a civil engineer. Living in Chicagoland allows me to experience the magnificence of what an architect can design or what a civil engineer can build. But there was a problem, I suck at math and physics. Obviously those two are key to become an architect or a civil engineer. In high school I took computer aided drafting (CAD) classes and did outstanding in them. I mastered the programs and technologies and could build houses on the computers and 3D print objects. While I was good with the software, I faltered in my math and physic classes. It was tough, and I struggled to get a C in my junior year math and physic classes. It didn’t help that my teachers in those classes weren’t very supportive or were overtly critical of my work. In my physics class, my teacher embarrassed me in front of the entire class by forcing me to attempt to solve a problem that I had no clue how to do. My physics teacher also told me that I should drop the class. I stayed in the class, but that’s when I realized that I probably wouldn’t become an architect or civil engineer.

            I had to do a reflection about what I career path I wanted to pursue. Always, my best subject has been history. So, I had a talk with my APUSH teacher after class one day about becoming a teacher. He was very supportive of me about becoming a history teacher, yet he warned me that it would be a lot of work and would require a lot of determination. The impact that he had on me made me feel like I could achieve my goal of being a history teacher. He was the best teacher I’ve ever had because, despite the challenges of APUSH, he made the class fun, engaging, and made me want to learn. It’s because of teachers like him that makes me want to become a history teacher. And I want to mold my teaching process based on the way he taught.

            One last thing that has really solidified to me why I want to be a history teacher is the way in which history is taught nowadays. I feel that history is not being taught properly and our view of history is distorted through the lens of pop culture, media, and political bias. I remember reading a news article my senior year of high school that the state of Oklahoma wanted to withhold funding for APUSH classes because the curriculum didn’t advocate for a “pro-American” perspective. When I first read it, I thought it was an Onion article. But when I saw it was real, I said to myself “what the f***?” Thankfully it didn’t come to fruition. But it raises a major issue that affects me as a future history teacher. Since when did teaching about facts and the truth become a bad thing? Why do primarily conservative states not want students to learn about the ugly truth? Truth hurts, get over it. Teaching about history has been tainted with political agendas and it makes me determined to overcome those agendas and teach students the truth.