To mark International Day of Education tomorrow, we look back at our interview with Keishia Thorpe.
“I’m an action person,” says Keishia Thorpe. “I don’t complain. It’s either you do something, or you don’t speak about it,” she says. And if there’s one thing Thorpe is known for, it’s taking action—especially in the face of refusal from the powers that be.
When Thorpe speaks, I’m engrossed in her words. She orates with a thoughtful mix of authority, passion, and empathy—and I can see why, as an educator for more than 17 years, she’s beloved by students and colleagues alike. I find myself wishing that I could sit in on one of her classes, that she could teach me something, anything.
When I hear her speak I feel revitalized. I want to do, to act. I feel shaken out of my depression regarding the state of the world and, instead, I’m hopeful that real change is, against all odds, possible. After all, Thorpe has facilitated her fair share of reform in this world, especially when it comes to the education sphere and bettering the lives of young people.
Among other things, Thorpe is an educator at International High School Langley Park in Bladensburg, Maryland. She wears many hats—a twelfth-grade teacher to English language learners, a union leader, an education lobbyist—and in 2021 she was recognized for winning the United Nations Global Teacher Prize, a $1 million award presented annually to what they call “an exceptional leader in the profession”.
While honored by recognition that goes unreceived by many teachers, winning the award brought about “a lot of pressure,” for Thorpe. Like any situation where one person is singled out from a group of millions, “now you have one teacher that represents a whole body of teachers”, Thorpe says (plus a large sum of money with which you must decide what to do). “Teaching is one of the most undervalued and least respected professions. We also make all other professions possible,” Thorpe says, which is why she’s an advocate for better pay and treatment of teachers on the local level, in Washington, and beyond. An increased salary will make the profession more competitive for and attractive to the younger generation, Thorpe says, “who we are going to rely on to pass on the baton of education”.
It’s hard to deny the impact of teachers when you meet ones as unforgettable as Thorpe. She teaches, however, because she experienced the transformative power of education firsthand. Growing up in Jamaica, “I didn’t even dream of college. That’s how poor we were,” Thorpe says. It was only after a track and field coach, who had heard that Thorpe and her twin sister were great athletes, reached out, that college became a possibility. “He told us that sports could help us get to college,” Thorpe says. After joining the team, Thorpe and her sister eventually had the opportunity to participate in Penn Relays, a showcase event held by the University of Pennsylvania.
“It opened up a whole new world for my sister and me, and it helped me realize what my potential could be,” Thorpe says. After more coaches saw athletic promise in the sisters, they both went on to receive scholarships and subsequently left Jamaica to attend college in the United States. Thorpe landed at Howard University, where she says she “blossomed into greatness” as an athlete, later going on to compete at Olympic-development level after graduating. Her takeaway? “I push my students and I tell them that through college sports I received a debt-free education,” she says—a significant feat for many people pursuing higher education in today’s world. “Graduating debt-free is important for people like me who come from poverty,” Thorpe says. “It means I can actually get out of college and have a fresh start in life. A track and field scholarship gave me the opportunity to pave my own path, to make life what it could be for myself,” she explains, allowing her to build generational wealth and break the cycle of poverty.
It was with this ethos in mind that Thorpe, alongside her sister, founded U.S. Elite International Track and Field Incorporated, a non-profit organization that helps low income or at-risk teens secure college athletic scholarships in the U.S. and internationally. “When my sister and I went to college, we knew that we left students behind who would die for that opportunity,” Thorpe says. Because Thorpe and her sister consider themselves “lucky”, they’re trying to make sure others have access to these opportunities—in other words, to make sure there’s no longer anything “lucky” about experiencing sports, getting an education, and graduating without financial burden.
“I’m always telling my students to join sports,” Thorpe says, even just for the enjoyment of playing, camaraderie, and eventfulness. “Some of those kids have never traveled out of their city,” she says. Whether it be visiting a neighboring town, state, or country, “sports did that for me”, Thorpe explains.
Her life’s journey from Jamaica to living in the U.S. is also why Thorpe now teaches twelfth-grade English language learners, as she feels their stories are “similar” to her own. “When students are connected to teachers, it enhances their learning experience and they achieve more,” Thorpe says. She also prioritizes making them feel welcome in her classroom, asserting that “learning comes second”, since you can’t learn when you’re uncomfortable. “I know how it is for them to come into a new country and feel like they don’t belong. I want to create an environment where they can feel safe,” she says.
Above all, through her work, Thorpe wants to be an inspiration not just to other teachers, but to her students, too. She wants the Global Teacher Prize to do just that: “This prize gives the profession hope,” she says. “It shows that teachers are valuable. We need education systems and the government to give more value to teachers.”
For now, the importance of teachers is, at the least, not lost on Thorpe and her pupils—especially considering that students regularly visit her from college or other occupations to reiterate her impact. Every year she has each class develop their own mantra that the students, in unison, repeat daily before beginning their lessons. “I don’t influence their mantra, I just teach them what a mantra is and how it can inspire them through their hardships,” Thorpe says. She has even had older students stop by her classroom for a visit and repeat their mantra, in jest, but also to show how ingrained by heart it is in their memory.
In a video highlighting one of her classrooms, students can be seen smiling through masks, eyes crinkled, animated, delivering the mantra to one another along with Thorpe. In so many words, their mantra states: “Believe in yourself and you can do it. Never say you can’t do it. If you fail, try again. Don’t let your past affect your future. Start strong, finish strong.” Words that many—high school students or not—might consider taking to heart in these trying times.
@keishiathorpe on Instagram
Image courtesy of Keishia Thorpe
