Thirteen years of Jess: Teacher, Mentor, and Friend
On Tuesday, June 6th, I sat down with Jess Brooks, who has taught math at Trillium Charter school since 2006, to talk about about what has been and her dreams for Trillium and herself in the future.
When Jess first came to Trillium, the school looked very different, not only in its actual school building and location (there was no water tower back then), but also in the way it functioned.
“When I started, they were just happy that I kept showing up to work,” Jess explained. “It was a pretty chaotic time, now it is calm in comparison. People were teaching in tents, we were moving buildings… there wasn’t a whole lot of direction at the high school level.”
Jess laughed, saying that it was a fun place to work. “Kids were literally climbing the flagpole outside of the school.”
I asked if she ever felt unsure if she wanted to work here or had any misgivings about being a teacher at Trillium.
Jess shook her head. “I loved this place, I was in such love with this place.” Jess said.
“You know, honeymoon period, this is the place I’m gonna retire from, I love the teaching staff, the kids are great.”
She added, “I love the community and I’ve always felt loved by this place, so it’s been mutually. It’s been hard, like any relationship, but yeah. All love.”
Jess helped the high school especially get where it is today, and developed the math program we use now.
According to Jess, she started with some names that the old math teacher handed her, like, ‘What is IMP?’
“There was no geometry class,” Jess said. “I looked at our test scores, and our geometry scores sucked, so we needed a full year of geometry.”
She explained that through the making of this new math program, she kept one main thing in mind.
“I tried to get more students successful at the early stages by bringing in more applied topics, more things they could use.” Jess said.
“It’s the community, the idea that we’re all in it together.”
I asked Jess if it was hard to pass this math program that she had created onto someone new. Jess smiled.
“My baby is twelve. It needs to rebel, and figure out who it is,” Jess said. “It’s got a good foundation that it can look back on and use. It’s got the right structures. It might decide that it doesn’t want to do a proficiency based assessment system, that it wants to do a growth based assessment system, and that’s up to it.”
Jess went on to talk about how, as time when on, she also began to assume administrative duties along with her teaching.
“As older Trillium staff have left, the things that they were holding landed with me. As people left, those things kept landing. Eventually, I was given an extra period to do that work,”Jess said.
At some point it became a conscious choice for Jess. She explained her reluctance to have someone new hired to take on the administrative duties she was currently carrying, because she would have to train them. “I knew in myself that I couldn’t work for someone that I was training and have them paid more than me.”
But eventually, after trying to carry both an administrative and teaching position for two years, Jess had to make another choice.
Jess said of administration, “I find it really stressful.”
“It’s not what I went into teaching to do. I went into teaching to teach math. And I really like teaching math.” She said.
Jess dreams of instructing other teachers in constructivist teaching methods and helping train them to not only grasp constructivism in a theoretical way, but also more technically, and how to implement it into a classroom.
Jess has been working at Trillium the majority of her adult life and she said that it was one of her first real jobs. I asked it if it was hard for her to be leaving Trillium after so long. She said, “Yeah, it’s hard.”
“Compared to where I was when I started here, I wasn’t as confident in myself as I am now.” Jess said about how Trillium has helped her to change and grow. “I’m stronger, more powerful, I know who I am. I know that I might struggle, I might not succeed, but I know that I’m gonna be okay.”
She explained, “Nothing’s been easy here, and so everything’s been a trial, so I feel like I’ve grown through the struggle.”
It’s hard for her to step away, but Jess feels that she is leaving Trillium in a good place. “There’s always drama, and there will always be drama, but I think that’s good, it’s necessary. There’s always this frustration, this idea that we could be doing better, and aren’t we supposed to be doing better? And I think that pushes us forward, and that’s good, and I think that will always be there too.”
She said of the other staff members to whom she will be “passing the torch” of the Trillium legacy, “They got it. We all build off of what was there. When we lose people, we end up losing part of what was held. But that’s not a bad thing. You can start building up different things.”
Finally, I asked Jess if she had anything she wanted to say to the students particularly, anything she wanted us to remember and carry forward for her.
These are the words she passed on to me and I will pass on to all of you.
“I say this often, but I don’t see it always. I think people should seek always to understand first. And that everyone is a good person. I don’t think people really believe that. Everyone is trying their best. And if you go about your day, thinking that, even if it’s not true, you will be better off. You will approach other people with love and compassion.”
Jess, thank you so very, very much for all you have done for us. We wish you the very best of luck as you move forward toward your dreams and we hope you will come back and visit. We’ll miss you.