I am tired. I want to quit.

I will be totally honest with you. These past months have been really hard. I think I am finally feeling the stress and the pressure of the work that I am doing. I guess this is what they call a teacher’s burnout. How I long to be back in the province, in the comfort of my friends and family. I go to work everyday, hoping against hope that I will find something that will fuel me to move forward but most of the time I fail. I ask myself,”Is it worth it?” Am I making the impact that I am supposed to be making? Or am I just holding on to something that I know will eventually break down?

Then just this afternoon, someone made me realize why I have been holding on for so long. That someone is Khylle. You see Khylle is one of my students. If you happen to enter my classroom, you will easily notice Khylle. He is one of those students who is usually timid and does not recite at all. In fact, if you will take a look at his grades you will see that he is one of those under performing students.

At the start of the school year, I already noticed that Khylle has a problem communicating not only in English but even in Filipino. When I looked at his journal, I was surprised because I cannot even understand a single word he had written. When I asked him, even he cannot understand what he wrote. It went on like this for months. Whenever I call him to recite, he would just utter an inaudible word. Whenever I ask him to solve, he would rather prefer to stay in his seat and I would just resort to calling someone else.

But today was different. Today, was a revelation. With the help of his mentor Lorie,  Khylle was able to stand for more than a minute trying to explain how to solve a mathematical problem. More than that, he was able to speak words that finally everyone understood. After he recited, the whole room exploded in applause. I couldn’t help but feel that finally, finally after months of struggle, I, together with the class, am seeing an improvement. No matter how small it may seem to some. But for me, it was already a big leap.

I guess these kinds of moments made me hold on despite all the personal struggles that I am going through. To finally see an improvement in a student who did not even know how to write or speak properly. To see a student patiently coach her classmate even though at times I see that they have a hard time understanding each other. To see a whole class feel proud of even the smallest achievement of their classmate who struggled for months. These moments make all the sacrifices worth it.

Khylle has a long way to go. But I realized, If Khylle did not give up, If Lorie did not give up on Khylle, If the whole class did not quit, what right do I have to give up on them?