The Biggest Challenge of My 1st Year in MTC

There were many challenges in my first year of the Mississippi Teacher Corps, but the biggest challenge was being a student as well as a teacher. Many times assignments were done the Friday night before class because I didn’t have the chance to sit down and do them until then. Although class was only every other Saturday, I seemed to be constantly on my way back to Oxford. Because I had to do assignments on Friday nights (sometimes after football games), I drove over two hours to be in class at 8:30 Saturday morning. The program seemed pretty straightforward last summer, and I didn’t think Saturday classes during the fall and spring would be too difficult. However, it took everything in me to force myself to do assignments and drive to Oxford. It sometimes felt like I didn’t get a break.
Being a part of MTC, you have to remember that you are a teacher and a graduate student. I feel like sometimes my lessons suffered because of the assignments for my classes at Ole Miss. For example, the day before our midterm in the Legal Education class, I basically gave my students busy work so that I could finish cramming for the exam. It worked (I got a 97!), but I still feel bad because that is one more day I could have devoted to educating my students.
This year I plan to do my assignments ahead of time, but we’ll see what happens. How do I make time for my assignments? Let’s be realistic—we’re taking 6 credit hours, only one class short of being full-time graduate students. In order to not procrastinate, it will probably be best to set aside a time (maybe Sunday afternoons) to work on assignments. I’m not sure if I will stick to this schedule, but even if I don’t, it will be my last semester of classes. Like my dad always told me, “You only have to do this once.”