The Educator

One of my favorite things to tell my students is how many times I’ve changed my path in life (so far the total is ten). Most of the changes were out of rather unfortunate circumstances, but I always managed to find a new path and no matter what happened or where I was, I came back to teaching. I started the profession during the best time to first become a teacher- 2008. I won’t go into details, but I left and eventually came back, and went through more hell, but stayed. Teaching was one of those things that came naturally to me, mainly because I love working with kids, and as much as they frustrate us I’ve got to say they’re pretty damn amazing. I have the absolute pleasure of teaching English to Juniors and Seniors at the moment, they’ve always been my favorite age because they’re starting to make their own choices, figuring out their own paths, becoming adults, and it is NOT easy. The school I work for is Title 1, a low income school, where a lot of my students have to work on top of everything else to help out their families. We provide food, supplies, anything really to help these kids to have one less worry and try and do their best to somehow focus on their school work. My students tell me stories that break my heart, things they go through that no child should ever have to experience, and still they manage to not only function, but thrive. Those kids are the reason I jumped on the chance to work with Creators Assemble! I love going through their notebooks and seeing their doodles, their thoughts, their stories. So much creativity just looking for an outlet, but not only do they have a lack of opportunity, a lot of these kids can’t see past what’s considered to be practical to be able to follow these passions. It’s not unknown the idea of the struggling artist, the poor writer, the infamous “slash” with career paths, I myself am a teacher/writer. You still have to work to survive, or in a lot of their cases, help their families survive. How are they going to have a chance to really know what they’re capable of when they have no idea where to go, how to promote themselves, what the next steps are. I see so much talent put aside as a hobby because of lack of opportunities. Sure, there's college, if you can afford it. And even with financial aid for those who qualify, oftentimes they’re still limited because they can’t afford to leave. Art school would be amazing...if they had the money. A Creative Writing degree would be great, if you had a guaranteed job after. And college is that first place most of us make our contacts. I met the President of our company, Moni Barrette, myself at Cal State Fullerton while there for our undergraduates. If the only people you know are the ones you grew up with and went to school with, it makes it difficult to make the kinds of connections one would need to get out and do something. I’m always looking for different ways to help my students with life after high school, with understanding how to function as an adult, to navigate our crazy world. The end of this school year was beyond any negative word I could come up with when we had hours to figure out lessons for distance learning, not knowing we would never see those kids again as schools wouldn’t open by the end of the year. I had three periods of Seniors, 98 kids (many of whom I had for multiple years) who got thrown into the weirdest possible end of their high school career to date in the most uncertain time we’ve had since I was born. They’re done now, they’ve graduated, so now what? They don’t even know if colleges will be in person or online, they don’t know if they can get jobs, they don’t have nearly as many options as they should. So why not be that option? Why not give students, kids, a chance to pursue that talent that has remained a hobby because of practicality? Why not help bring these young adults together with mentors, guidance, structure? If we have the ability to help, why not help? That’s all I want to do, I want to help these kids go on and be great people, citizens, family members, human beings, artists. I want to raise my own children and show them how if we come together as a community we can use our resources in ways we never knew possible. If someone you know has the ability to launch another person’s career, why not bring them together? Creators Assemble represents that hope for me for these kids and any other artist/writer/person out there who just wants that chance. Let’s go be that chance.

- Tiffany Dolven-Strang, Creators Assemble! Secretary