My decision to become an early childhood teacher was a fairly simple one. I knew that I loved interacting and working with young children and knew that this was something that just felt right for me. As my dad once told me, “Adam, you always loved being around little kids, even when you were a little kid.”

I recall looking at a brochure about doing an early childhood teaching degree at a particular university. I saw this picture on the front of a small child with this rather interesting look on their face. It was a look of curiosity, wonder and contentment all rolled into one, and I was hooked.

At that very moment, I knew that this was my true calling. My life’s work was going to be about making a difference in the world through teaching. But not just any difference. I knew I was going to make a positive contribution to not only young children but to my community, to my society and to also education in general. As much as this sounds all very airy-fairy I actually believed it (and still do). Like Steve Jobs once said, “the people who are crazy enough to think that they can change the world are the ones that do.” These thoughts also led me to these feelings just like I was a young child again. You know the ones you get when it’s almost your birthday or Christmas time. But I also had to begin to take on a mindset to match this to get me through a multitude of hurdles along the way.

I knew that this journey of mine was not going to be easy. Firstly I had to actually get into university and secondly, I had to pass everything to get my degree. As I didn’t do that well in high school this was going to more challenging. And to be honest, back then with my own schooling, it was more about me being initially afraid of my own success with a generous dose of laziness thrown in with it. This new tertiary academic world was going to be like going to a new planet for me. Lots of new things to learn and equally lots of new things to ponder on. Initially, it actually took me three attempts to get accepted into the Bachelor of Early Childhood Teaching. My first two attempts were learning experiences in themselves and this set the foundation for what would become my life’s work.

I wanted to give up many times on trying to get into university and nearly did. My first enrolment attempt was a step into the world of hard knocks of real-life (and real disappointment). This being that my high school graduation score was crucial for this yet unfortunately pretty woeful. After my second knock back a friend of mine suggested that I enroll in evening college and do some short courses to improve my university chances on the next try. I was beginning to feel like a failure and didn’t really want there to be a next try. But something inside of me kept pushing me forwards, spurring me on towards my goal.

So there I was enrolled in evening college for some early childhood short courses. I got some very strange looks from all the other students for being the only male in these courses and began to wonder if this really was my true calling. But yet again I persevered with this and along the way got some great support from my fellow students once they realized I was genuine about my life goal. With a year of evening college under my belt and some great references from the teachers there I lodged my third attempt at university admission and was finally accepted.

It’s strange looking back all these years later how I realized that the first couple of university attempts gave me a really good learning foundation. This being that all the experiences, knockbacks and disappointments leading up to that point seemed just right for me and my situation. And as I was working for a road construction company throughout those years I felt had received many invaluable life lessons about resilience and believing in my dreams and myself.

But there were a lot more challenges that lay ahead, a lot more.