Jake Barrett

What are your main responsibilities?

Within the classroom, I’m responsible for providing support and services for students who have been diagnosed with a disability that adversely impacts their ability to access the curriculum of the class.  I also work with the content and teacher of the class to preview the upcoming curriculum to problem solve potential trouble spots before they arise in class. Outside the classroom, I work as a liaison for some of the students I teach.  I communicate with their parents and other support givers to ensure that all of the student’s needs are being addressed.

How did you get into teaching special education?

A few different factors influenced my career choice.  My father, who was also a special education teacher, passed away suddenly when I was young of a heart attack while at work one day.  Secondly, I hated my 3rd grade teacher.  Her approach to issues I had with my hand writing and the pain it caused me was to assign me extra writing homework every night and keep me in from recess if I didn’t write enough. Lastly, my own experience getting diagnosed with a learning disability when I was 12 years old.  I was unwilling to accept the help being offered because I was so self conscious and concerned with how it would look to my friends and classmates.  It ultimately cost me a few extra years of life to get through college because of a lack of essential skills. I don’t want other students to have those same negative experiences, so I work to give them a positive self-concept and a positive association with the supports they have available to them.

How has your teaching affected you?

I appreciate that I have a role in shaping the minds and experiences of students who, as adults, will be my peers and neighbors.  If I want to surround myself with better citizens in the future then I have to, in any way I can, help them now.