I had lunch with a former student yesterday. It was great to connect and hear how things are going, not just for him, but for his brother and a few other former students he still connects with. It grounds me when I have these opportunities. It reminds me that school is just a short stop on the journey of life. It puts school into perspective.

And yet, despite saying that, the experience we give to students is so important. I read a post on LinkedIn yesterday by an educator I admire and respect. He has a wonderful, high needs kid with challenges that make her school experience difficult. In the post he shared how inflexible the system, or more specifically some people in the system, have been with her… and how hard it has been for her to cope with this in addition to the challenges she faces.

Going back to my visit, this student went to our school when I was overwhelmed, running 3 schools and also dealing with chronic fatigue. He remembers how I struggled. He reminded me of my own challenges I had. But that wasn’t the focus of our conversation, and it wasn’t the only thing we reminisced about.

Still, this provides a little insight into a couple things. First of all, we all deal with things that affect how we cope with daily life, and we can’t really see how we are affected by circumstances or even be aware of how circumstances are affecting others. Secondly, as short as the school journey is, it makes a huge difference in peoples lives.

Our interactions, our attention, our considerations, our disposition, and our actions make differences in the experiences of students. We don’t know the full impact we will have. We don’t know the things people will remember about us when they move on… the best we can do is to remember that all of our interactions matter, and that we have an impact whether we realize it or not, so let’s work to make that impact the best it can be.