We are approaching the day where monotonous jobs and tasks will all be done by machines, which is both scary and exciting. Our educational system is outdated because it runs parallel to what was needed in the workforce years ago. The children of today will take care of us in the future, we owe it to them to give them the resources they need to be prepared.
We should incorporate teaching them to think deeper, critically, and more creatively.

We should focus on doing whatever we need to do to protect and ensure that our kids be taken care of, by all means, starting with education. We live in a world full of educated and loving professionals who would know the better ways we can help children and give them the resources that they need to live more fulfilling lives.

My name is Arianna, I have been working with families and children for about 5 years now. Both of my parents have experience working for Miami-Dade County Public Schools and I joined them on their venture at Open Mind Learning and Fine Arts. Together, we operate an academic after-school care program. On a day-to-day basis, we help children with their homework, we review what they did in school with their teachers, and we prepare them for tests, every day is different.

Some need more help in reading, or for others it’s math, and for our older students, it could be helping them organize themselves with deadlines and guiding them with motivation and encouragement. Every student and their needs are different. We try our best to personalize what we do with them.

Since my parents know about the educational system in Miami-Dade, they offer their insight to our families on a variety of things. For example, how to check their grades, a lot of translating, and how to contact teachers. We tell them about upcoming tests and how to understand diagnostic scores. A lot of the time, they speak to us more than their student’s teachers so we try to answer to educate them as much as we can.

Educationally, COVID-19 set us back and I felt that this was the year where I saw kids struggle the most. Mostly, in part, because they were working hard but not feeling that sense of accomplishment and success because, by standards, it still wasn’t enough. This is where the beauty of teaching and learning crumbles. I am proud of the kids we worked with this year and their resilience and proud of the parents who understood that it wasn’t something we could fix overnight and that patience and trust were needed. It was a challenging year but we did it.

I consider myself very lucky, I am around families and children who strive for better and they trust me with that process, it is very special to me. I get to be around children of all types, they are all funny and smarter than they think. I consider myself a complete resource to them. As much as I help them, they do so much more for me on both a personal and professional level. It’s something I am really grateful for.