new teacher profiles
Finding fulfillment at UFT charter school
Sep 25, 2008 4:04 PM
Flavio Benson wants to give his students "a love for learning, the ability to exceed their own goals and to make sure that feeling of enjoyment they have about coming to school continues."
Having a revelation, ditching his office job, going for his master’s in education and, at last, becoming a teacher! It was going to be great!
It wasn’t.
Flavio Benson’s first year as an elementary school teacher was an object lesson in what a school environment shouldn’t be.
“I worked with good people but the kids were hard to manage and the administration didn’t put a lot of emphasis on getting support to the students who needed it most, or giving me the support I needed to further myself as a teacher,” Benson said.
He was frustrated. An earlier stint of tutoring kids in New York had been such a great experience it was what sent him to graduate school to begin with.
“I was certain this was what I should be doing but I was having a difficult time,” the Florida native said. “I realized the school just wasn’t a good place for me so I decided to find a more positive situation.”
At a job fair last spring he wound up chatting with some recruiters at a particular booth whose philosophy resonated with him.
“I noticed that the school was run by the UFT,” he said. “I had been to some UFT seminars and felt they were informative and the people were friendly and supportive. So I figured if there’s a school run by the UFT, I’d be in good hands.”
Every morning, after his epic commute from the Bronx to the UFT Charter Elementary School in Brooklyn, he sees “kids coming to school who really enjoy coming to school. My students are 4th-grade students. They’re still going to give you headaches, but they try very hard and are very respectful.”
One big difference between his first-year experience and his second is “the collegial environment here,” Benson said.
“There’s a lot of communication, and even though we teach different subjects and grades we’re all working together toward the same goal,” he said. “You never feel there’s anyone you couldn’t talk to. Everyone is accessible.”
Benson finds his biggest challenge is “balancing everything I want to do for my students and school with doing everything I have to do in my personal life, like buying groceries, doing laundry, all those errands,” he said. In addition to running errands, he’ll be running in the New York City Marathon in November.
Training as a new teacher and training for the marathon is a handful, but at least now Benson feels he’s in the right place for accomplishing his professional goals.
“So far it’s been excellent,” he said. “What I want to give my students is a love for learning, the ability to exceed their own goals and to make sure that feeling of enjoyment they have about coming to school continues.”
