Fraser McKay, Computing Teacher at St John Ogilvie High School in Hamiltonl shares his experience as a teacher…
“I’m Fraser McKay. I’m a computing teacher at St John Ogilvie High School in Hamilton. I’ve been here for about two-and-a-half years. People were a little bit surprised when I said I was going to apply to be a teacher. People would think of me as quite a quiet, shy person, and some of my friends who are teachers were supportive but like, ‘Are you sure?’
“I think just because they thought that I would be really shy about it and I probably did as well. So in a way, it’s kind of surprised me that I’ve found actually, I really enjoy being around kids all day. It almost feels a kind of selfish thing to say but I realised the buzz that I got from it after I taught that first lesson. So I was absolutely terrified but I got so much of a buzz after it and then I realised I was hyper for the rest of the day and kind of couldn’t come down. And to be honest, that’s a big part of it. And that maybe sounds a kind of slightly selfish reaction to it, you know, that I do it because I enjoy it, but it’s true.
“There’s just a feeling in a school, a kind of energy in a school, the excitement…there’s a buzz about it, I think.”
“Just in the last few months I had an opportunity to become responsible across the school for digital learning and that’s been an interesting opportunity for me, I think to develop those skills where I’m talking to different people across the school and having to go and organise things and having to maybe be up front a little bit and speaking to different teachers and developing a wee bit of leadership. But I’m really enjoying that.
“I think I am more confident in general with other things. That’s kind of rubbed off. In general, I’m probably more confident outside school which I hadn’t expected.”