Here’s another student story.
Most of the information in this story is in the public domain and comes from the article: https://www.athletesvoice.com.au/lisa-alexander-leadership-lessons-young-mum/. So I am going to use this student’s real name – in a minute.
For the moment I’m going to talk about ‘Elsie’ as she was universally known at the high school where I taught. Elsie was a nickname. It came from her initials ‘LC’ (which, if it isn’t immediately obvious to you, sounds like Elsie when you blend the letters together).
Elsie was the only girl in my Year 12 Physics class. She was, without doubt, one of the brightest students I ever had the privilege to work with – and the 10 boys in the class didn’t like that she was brighter than them.
She was a star student, School Captain, and President of the SRC. Elsie was also a star on the netball court.
We all knew she wanted to go into Medicine, and she got into Monash easily. It was obvious she was going to go far and wondered if, one day, we would have the opportunity of being treated by Dr Clark.
But it wasn’t to be.
In her own words
I was trialling for the Victorian under-21 netball team when I found out I was three months pregnant. I thought I had a tumour in my uterus. I was 18, and I was at university studying medicine.
All of this happened at once. I was horrified. Truly. I thought, ‘What am I going to do? How is this going to affect my family, who are so proud of me?’
Basically, what was I going to do with my life?
Being an unmarried mother was still frowned upon in those days. My friends couldn’t believe it. I was a goody two-shoes, school captain and SRC president. For me to be pregnant was seen as a huge disappointment, but I grew up quickly and I’m grateful for that.
Elsie didn’t finish her medical degree. She took time off to have the baby and then went back to become a teacher.
Posted to a country school in south-east Victoria, she quickly became part of the community – and, as a PE teacher who had played Netball at an elite level, began coaching the local netball team.
It wasn’t all plain sailing from there, but Elsie went all the way to become head coach of the Australian Diamonds. By that time she was Lisa Alexander.
That part of the story is pretty well known.
But what would have happened if she hadn’t become pregnant? Did the world miss out on a great doctor? Or did the world gain by having a wonderful netball coach who became an example to thousands of Australian girls and young women?
Of course, we will never know. We, each of us, have only one life to live and whatever path it takes us is the only path we will know. But Lisa Alexander never stopped being Elsie. She was always a great example to others and I am sure she would have been an equally great example if she had gone on with medicine. The difference is she has shown that one unforeseen turn is not the end of all your dreams. She demonstrated the ability to bounce back and grasp the opportunity that opened up to her.
So often, we, as teachers, have dreams and expectations for our students. We hope they will go on to great things, but it doesn’t work out that way. We have to remember that of all the things we taught them, we hope we taught them never to give up and never to lose hope. And that whatever things they do go on to, they will go on to be great people.