Choices do count…at least we think they are important since this is the third time we have addressed it in three years.  Looking back at the opinions we had during those years makes me aware of how much MORE importance is given to choice in this age of a world-wide pandemic.  I never dreamed I would live to see people make a choice to riot and break into the capital building.  I am also amazed at the division of our citizens into opposing groups over a vaccine.  I grew up in the age of polio and now as then, I prayed for a vaccine to be discovered which would ensure safety for our people.  But unlike the population in which I grew up and in which people were ready, willing, and able to get the vaccine, today’s population is haunted by jeers and taunts regardless of their choice to vaccinate or not to vaccinate.

    I believe the difference I am seeing is a direct result of social media influencing large groups of the population.  It is difficult to make a stand when a person stands alone.  However, when one is led to believe thousands are standing with him/her in their choices, it is easier to be swayed into making a stand along with those thousands.

    I always remember my fifth-grade teacher saying to our class, “You only have two things which you MUST do in life: pay your taxes and die.”  The rest of life is filled with choices.  Over the last five years or so, I have found an increase in the number of helicopter parents.  These parents do not allow their children to make choices which might bring pain or discomfort.  The result I see is a generation of children who stress out over anything that isn’t predetermined for them.

    Being the owners of a private school which is not getting the help afforded to tax-exempt non-profit agencies, we realize the IMPORTANCE of school choice.  Our classes would not be filled if parents and children had not made the choice to be in Lawton Academy.  We also realize that if we want to remain their choice for an education, we must make good choices in the staff we hire, the curriculum we teach, and the improvements we keep making.

    I could not finish this blog on “choice” if I didn’t add the single most important choice I have made in life.  I chose to believe that God so loved the world that He gave His only son so that whosoever believes in Him shall have eternal life.”  Since approximately twenty plus students I have taught are already gone through death, I take this choice quite seriously. I want to help all my students make good choices in academics, health, and spiritual matters.  As long as I present the facts and teach them to think and make wise decisions, I feel God will allow me to continue in this most wonderful profession I have chosen as mine since the age of sixteen.

Kay