Letter to the editor: From Goodman Stadium to the classroom

Sports have always been a huge part of my life. From the first time my dad first bounced a basketball my way at age five to the night I won Offensive MVP for the Mountain Hawks during my senior year, sports have influenced me in major ways. Many of my best friends, role models and inspirations come from the network I built playing basketball, and especially football.  Football taught me so much – discipline, time management, teamwork and perseverance, to name a few. And as I thought about what I wanted to do after I hung up my jersey, I realized that football had prepared me for a job many of my teammates and I hadn’t given much thought to: teaching.

I first realized the parallels between my life as an offensive lineman and the work on education’s front lines when I met a recruiter from Teach For America at a career fair. We talked about the inequities in our education system, which I had seen fail too many of my friends. Our conversation got me excited about the role I could play in fighting those inequities, so after graduation, I joined TFA and moved to southwest Ohio to teach middle school math.

As I found my feet in the classroom, I had to grow quickly in areas like public speaking and classroom management. As I did, so many of the traits that had propelled me to my starting spot at Lehigh drove my work as a teacher forward, too. All those times you had to play, and play well, in front of hundreds of people? They taught you how to perform under pressure. Those games where you knew you were the underdog but you continued to push forward? That translates to resilience. The hundreds of hours you’ve spent getting lost in the game with your teammates, working together to strategize, communicate and press toward your goals? These built foundational skills and mindsets that principals and parents look for in the teachers they want for their kids.

As Mountain Hawks, we hold ourselves and each other to high standards. Daily, we live out our community’s commitment to resiliency, teamwork and overcoming adversity. Those are exactly the mindsets I bring to the classroom and the ones I work hard every day to cultivate in my students. My kids and I are a team and, in order to succeed, we have to work together, communicate, trust one another, take responsibility for our mistakes and overcome the significant challenges to reach our goals. In short, we have to leave it all on the field.

My students rise to this challenge every day. When I see the kids I coach in basketball show grit on and off the court, when they yell, “What up, Coach Hood!,” when they pass me in the hallway, when they get higher scores on quizzes than they expected, I get the same rush I used to feel when I nailed a tough block. That feeling that drives your commitment to your sport – that sense of deep pride that comes only after practicing and working and persevering to do your part for the people counting on you – it doesn’t go away when you trade the sports gear for teacher’s chalk. As athletes, we strive to jump higher, run faster, push farther. When we become teachers, we ask our kids to do the same – give their all and reach new heights. It’s a legacy that lives on long past any conference title or national championship.

One of my students has severe ADHD and is often picked on. At the beginning of the year, I started pulling him out of specials to give him some one-on-one coaching on concepts that were giving him trouble. I made a game out of our sessions, rewarding him every time he beat the clock. At the start of the school year, he struggled to even add 2 + 2. Now, with hard work and practice, he’s doing word problems with negative integers. Last week, I handed him back his test – his first ‘B.’ Victory never tasted so sweet.

Ashton Hood, ’14, is a former offensive lineman for the Mountain Hawks. He currently teaches math at Dayton Leadership Academy as a Teach For America – Southwest Ohio corps member. To apply to teach, visit www.teachforamerica.org/apply.