Getting Ready

In August 2018, I went to my university advisor to ask how I could get ahead for missing a week of school due to an international trip I had planned mid-semester. "I love international experiences!" my advisor exclaimed. "I did some of my student teaching in Australia!"

I paused and considered what it would be like to student teach overseas. "...Is that still a thing?" 

Thus the research began for our quest to find how we could make this "a thing" at Tennessee Tech. By the end of the fall semester, we found a program at Indiana University (IU) called the Global Gateway for Teachers. I submitted my registration set through the mail in March and received the confirmation email soon after.

Global Gateway has a large selection of countries to choose from. Since I am a secondary education math major, I could only choose countries where that was allowed in which the school's main instruction is in English. After narrowing down my choices, I landed on India.

In July 2019, my advisor met with the coordinator of the Indian school at a conference in Indiana. That really set the ball rolling on this opportunity as vague concepts of the experience became more concrete with faces and names. I booked my plane ticket, got my visa application approved, and became in frequent contact with the school principal.

I am going without many expectations, but I have a good feeling this experience will be so different than any other overseas trip I have been on. I was thinking of a catchy title for this blog that's math-y and Indian-y, so I combined the word namaste, the Hindi word for hello, and theta, which is a math variable for angle measurements. If you're interested in Indian culture and/or mathematics, I hope you enjoy my future posts.

Follow me on this blog for updates and pictures! I am so excited to meet, build friendships, and do life with the people at Drishti Dr. R.C. Jain Innovative Public School. Here we go!