Falcon Flyer Spring 2019 | Page 9

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ND: What was the last book you read?

DS: Well, it's funny you should say that because we were just talking this morning about our summer books. I read all the time. One of the books that I'm reading with my team right now is The Case for Servant Leadership. It was an administrative goal for us to come together to understand the tenets of servant leadership which drive my practice. I'm also working with the board on understanding that. But that's one of those books that I have read time and time again. Brene Brown has a series of books; one I love is Daring Greatly and the other is Dare to Lead, which I am about half way through. I love her work. I think we need more empowering messages out there, and she offers that. Most recently Simon Sinek has a new book out that I have on my bedside table that I haven't touched yet, but I've loved his work. This one is Find Your Why. It's about discovering purpose for you and your team. I'll let you know after I finish it. I just re-read The Alchemist with my daughter who's a senior in high school. So, that's a book I've read before, but I'm reading it again because it's one of those books that when you read it at different times of your life, it reveals different messages. The crux

of it is about your personal journey, and how, when you are pursuing your true personal legend, the Universe conspires to support you. I think it is a great book for anyone making a life change.

ND: Since you mentioned your past in teaching, what would you say got you into education?

DS: Ironically, education wasn't my first career. I was in sales, and I was a corporate trainer. I realized that I was good at training people, and I was traveling all over the country. I wrote training manuals for retail sales. It was about how to train your staff, how to work with customers, how to overcome objections, how to manage a store, all that kind of stuff. And although I loved the training piece of it, I didn't really love retail. I had a friend who was a middle school math teacher and she told me about a program called “Math in the Real World” that she used in her classroom. She knew I was in the fashion industry and told me many of her students wanted to be in fashion. She asked me if I would come spend the day with her and talk to her students about how math is used in the real world. So, I spent the day with her middle school students, rambunctious middle school students, and I went home that night and I said to my husband, who was my fiance at the time, that I needed to go back to school, because I wanted to become a teacher. He asked me what I would teach. I have always loved literature and I wanted to teach English. Reading literature and writing was always my passion when I was in school. Like you, I was a writer and wrote for the school newspaper and I wrote the introductory poem for my yearbook. I was very much into writing, but I never really pursued it. I went back to school, and that's how I wound up teaching. Yup, that was kind of a weird path. But you know, I don't think everybody's path is necessarily straight. More likely than not, the journey is complicated and convoluted. I think you have to figure out what you really enjoy doing, and find a way to do it.