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What I didn’t learn at Houghton…

By Trina A. Kraus

Houghton College didn’t teach me everything I needed to know. At least, not the way I expected it to.

Houghton College didn’t teach me that I might have a student in my classroom who stares blankly ahead when I ask her to complete a short vocabulary assignment. “She’s in tenth grade,” I think to myself. “I’m sure that she is capable of completing this assignment.” I ask her to please do her vocabulary. She looks at me and says, “Yes, okay Miss,” and then, “Miss, what’s Downzyndrom?” She says the new words all together, like one word. This is not one of the terms on her vocabulary list. I look at her and I slowly start to say, “Well, it’s a disorder…that some people are born with…,” and as I speak I realize why she’s not doing her vocabulary assignment. She says to me, “Miss, ’cause yesterday they did a special test on me, and they say that my baby has water on its brain or something. I don’t know what I’m going to do now. They need me to tell them what I’m going to do.”

Vocabulary now seems very unimportant to me, too. Houghton College didn’t give me a pat answer for her.

Houghton College didn’t tell me that I would be teaching a 9^th grade English class when intruders enter the school building and run through the aisles of desks taunting the students and me, and then kick the door off its hinges on the way out. Houghton College didn’t teach me how to hold back the tears when I realize that my students have problems that I cannot fix by bringing them mittens and medicine, and the right answers to all of their questions.

Houghton College didn’t teach me to marry a soldier—I found him myself. In May 1992, when I was 14, I wrote in my diary, “there is a boy at youth group named John Kraus, and he’s really cute…” Little did I know that twelve years later that boy would be my husband, serving a year’s tour of duty with a U.S. Army combat unit in Baghdad, Iraq. We live with uncertainty every day.

Houghton College didn’t open my brain and pour all the “right answers” inside, nor did it offer trite answers. Houghton College couldn’t possibly have prepared me for everything that would come my way.

After leaving Houghton, though, I found myself equipped with the discipline that it takes to commit to a job. I left the college knowing that there is a Power bigger than me. Knowing Who is in control, and Who is able to fix things and Who is prepared for everything that comes my way gives me the tools to deal with that terrible feeling of uncertainty. Houghton College couldn’t just put God in my life. I had to learn and grow for myself.

Trina (Frederick ’99) Kraus teaches English in the Philadelphia school district.