Ava Finn

Fredj
Honors 397 A
12 December 2022
Final Peer Educator Reflection

Thinking back on my mentality of leadership in the spring, I realize how much

confidence I lacked in myself. I had so many ridiculous metrics of myself to become an “ideal”

Peer Educator. I remember envisioning myself completing all of my lesson plan drafts in perfect,

measured increments throughout my week, drawing out individual icons to place in my slide

decks, and memorizing my instructions for everything verbatim. Practically, I knew this would

not happen (and it didn’t!), but I put the pressure on myself to be incredibly disciplined because

it felt like a tangible way to make myself feel worthy of leadership. I thought if I was as

organized and regimented as I could possibly be, I would be the best possible Peer Educator for

my students and could justify to myself why I had the role. I remember after my first teaching

section going home and feeling really disappointed in myself because, unsurprisingly, I was not

perfectly organized, my planned activities were not perfectly timed, and I took a very casual,

natural tone with the class. In terms of the actual outcome, I knew things had gone relatively

well, but I felt a nagging guilt like I had done my job poorly. Even though I’ve been a leader in

many cases before, this opportunity felt so personal to me, and that seemed to translate into a

definition of leadership that was oriented towards how I felt about myself, hoping those things

would project positively for my class.

Looking back on how my teaching actually went this quarter, I feel like I’ve really

learned the value of teaching with vulnerability. Even though I didn’t feel great about my first

section, I was reminded of how meaningful it can be to be casual and open with students through

my connections to the other PEs. Having our debriefs together really made me feel more
confident and led me to abandon a lot of the notions I had in favor of embracing my own natural

personality and teaching style. I integrated a lot of activities and approaches I gathered from

everyone else in class, and ultimately decided that this kind of effort and thought should be my

priority over abstract metrics of organization. In the end, I actually started to really appreciate my

own teaching style, and though it did not follow the convention I’d built in my head, I think

that’s why I ended up having such an intimate atmosphere and my students opened up about

really personal things with me. One of my favorite parts of this experience has been the

relationships I’ve had with my students and how vulnerable they’ve been willing to be with me,

so as I began to see how my own teaching helped foster that, it became more personally

cemented as how I’d like to lead in the future. Much of how I did this was by being really

participatory in my own activities, especially our icebreakers. I talked a lot with my students

about my own feelings my first year which helped thaw the room a little bit, and made an effort

to let them lead as they needed at certain moments (asking them what style they prefer for an

activity, checking in on what they needed/what would be most helpful, etc).

In terms of our course itself, I can’t really verbalize everything I have been able to take

away from it. The community we built in H397 became the blueprint I strived for in my own

classroom and I took so many notes and queues from Nadra, Claire, and the other PEs when

making my lesson plans and improvising in class. More personally, the check-in and my time

reflecting has shown me how meaningful teaching is to me and has outlined it more clearly as an

aspect I think I will need in a future career. A lot of what Nadra has said in the past about how

they came to enjoy being an advisor started to play out in my own PE experience, and the sense

of fulfillment teaching brought me this quarter hasn’t been replicated in any other part of my life.

It is so rewarding to feel like an accessible mentor for someone else, and the students who have
personally reached out to me have helped me affirm that this should be a key part of my future

career.

I really hope to return as a Peer Educator next quarter and with that in the back of my

mind, I’ve given a lot of thought to what I want to change and achieve if I have the opportunity. I

think a major priority for myself is to hone in on my teaching style now that I’ve developed more

of a respect for it. I would really like to think about how to categorize and communicate it to be

more helpful in collaborative environments similar to this, because sometimes I find myself

unable to really articulate my approach. I’d also like to improve my UW Resources section and

consider ways to make that more helpful and engaging. In the broader realm of leadership, I hope

to focus more on student and peer feedback and worry less about my own sense of qualification.

I’d also like to expand my creativity as a leader, because I sometimes notice myself falling into

patterns from a planning perspective and I think it can be really valuable to mix things up! Most

importantly, I want to make sure that my future leadership is driven by my own experience and

what I wish had been different, because that component of my time as a PE has shaped so much

of the success I have felt teaching.