The Heart of Teaching

Yesterday I found myself at the front of a classroom full of young men and women from countries around the world. Each with a unique history, they spoke spanish, arabic, tagalog. Some soldiers, some refugees, some had migrated as children with their parents across the borders of Latin America. I am their teacher.

What's your first love? You know, the career or pastime where you discovered yourself through your passion for it. For me, that's an easy one!  It has always been teaching. Directly following graduation from Wake Forest, I spent 5 great years teaching and coaching in Maryland's public schools. Since then, my career led to a different kind of training and teaching: sales and management positions and the founding of Hopkins Consulting in 1982. This enterprise gave me countless venues for speaking, training, and of course consulting. 

From time to time, I have fancied myself back in the classroom, perhaps on a small college campus, working with students again. Now, that dream comes to fruition at Blue Ridge Community College.  I looked out into the sea of faces today and remembered that teaching is about being taught. Teaching is about being inspired. Teaching is about returning to the drawing board and rolling up your sleeves. 

I can't wait to see what the semester holds.

Bill Hopkins 

(Image credit: www.mywaynesborocfa.com)