New Year. New superintendent. New opportunities for North Carolina students.

There is something special about NEW. The possibilities. The fears. The opportunities.

I know about new. I was the new kid often. Four different High Point schools in five years, each move a marker of my family’s struggle to make ends meet during my parents’ divorce. In those years, I learned early about both hardship and hope — often in the same moment.

Even though I was new in schools, there were some things that were consistent. I had great teachers who cared about me. Music was always my favorite class. The art rooms always smelled like tempura paint. And every year, there would be a holiday canned food drive.

I was eight years old and in third grade when I watched my classmates stream in carrying their donations, some lugging entire bags of canned goods. My stomach was in knots. I knew all too well that I couldn’t bring in food, and I also knew where those donations were headed — to families like mine.

That morning, fighting back tears, I approached my teacher to apologize for not being able to contribute. I couldn’t take food from our own sparse pantry just to help win a popcorn party, but I felt like I was letting everyone down. Instead of dismissing my concerns or offering empty comfort, she hugged me and transformed my shame into purpose, giving me the special job of counting and tallying all the donations.

As I worked at my new task, a classmate walked in with the most delicious culinary delicacy that has ever graced the shelves of a Food Lion: two boxes of powdered mashed potatoes.

Before I could stop myself, I whispered under my breath, “Oh, I hope we get those.”

The day after the drive was over my mom picked us up from school because she was also picking up our boxes. My teacher thanked me for my tallying help and whispered to me that she made sure the mashed potatoes were in our holiday boxes.

She’d heard my whispered dream, and she made it come true. That moment taught me something profound about the power of educators who truly see and hear their students.

That moment and so many others made me want to become a teacher myself.

Years later, I was new in schools again, but this time as a new teacher in Guilford County. After a couple years, Maurice “Mo” Green became our superintendent. I remember as a teacher working for him. He always sent warm and heartfelt emails to the staff, encouraging us and recognizing our hard work and love for our students.

One specific email from him spoke straight to my heart. He said, “It is remarkable to know that our students’ dreams become yours, and as educators and support staff, you work your hardest to turn these dreams into reality.”

Those words resonated deeply because I had lived both sides of that truth — as a student whose dream was heard, and as a teacher striving to ensure every student in my high school classroom had the same opportunity for their dreams to be heard and realized.

Superintendent Green understood then, as he does now, that education and the public school experience is about more than lessons and test scores. It’s about building people, building humanity.

As the son of a teacher, he knows that the calling of an educator runs deeper than content and instruction. He recognized that everyone in our schools — teachers, support staff, custodians, school nutrition professionals, bus drivers — are all educators working toward our students’ dreams.

In his words, we serve as “wonderful role models for not just our students, but in our community as well.”

He thanked us for “standing up for our young people and for our public schools,” understanding that advocacy for education is advocacy for dreams.

That is what this new role of his is all about: advocating for the dreams of the 1.5 million public school children in North Carolina. Each student carries their own whispered dreams, just like I once carried mine.

Statistically that little girl counting canned goods probably wasn’t supposed to become the North Carolina Teacher of the Year. But because public school educators saw past my empty belly and dirty clothes to see my potential, I stand here today.

My story isn’t unique. It’s multiplied in classrooms across our state, where students full of promise need excellent educators to help them actualize their dreams.

Mo Green not only understands this, he champions it. When he reminded us in an email that we have “more successes than challenges,” he was acknowledging the transformative power of educators who see beyond circumstances to potential. He knew that moments matter — when a bus driver notices a student’s empty backpack, when a school nutrition professional spots a hungry child, when a teacher hears a whispered wish.

Because every time an educator sees past circumstances to recognize potential, every time educators make a student’s dream their own, we create another new story of possibility.

Green lived this truth as our district superintendent, creating environments where these daily miracles could flourish.

Superintendent Green, you once shared this in an email that kicked off a new school year: “This year, as we focus once again on new possibilities, let’s stay true to our vision of excellence in academics and character and all that we do. Thanks to each of you, we have more successes than challenges, so let the first day of school and the celebrations begin. The possibilities are truly limitless.”

That is what I remind you of today.  In your own words:  “Stay true to your vision of excellence in academics and character…. The possibilities are truly limitless.”

As we ring in the new year with our new superintendent, let his oath remind us that public education is not just a service. It’s a constitutional right and a sacred trust.

Just as my third-grade teacher upheld that trust by fulfilling a child’s whispered wish, just as Green upheld that trust as GCS superintendent by recognizing that “every student, every teacher, and every classroom deserves an equal opportunity for success,” today’s oath will seal his commitment to uphold that trust for every child in North Carolina.

Whether a student’s dreams are screamed, whispered, or unspoken, our new superintendent understands that their dreams become all our dreams, and it’s our sacred duty to help make them a reality.

Today is the start of that.