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It was in 2nd grade that I started getting really interested in the wider world.
My first fascination was with landlocked countries.
Mrs. Schulman got out the atlas.
She helped me identify a number of landlocked countries.
I wrote reports on Paraguay, Afghanistan, and she would read them.
She talked to me about them, and I decide I'm going to write a report on Palestine.
She talked to me about Palestine, and she said,
Megan, you do know that Palestine doesn't exist anymore.
And I thought, hmm.
And then I went home and sitting in the driveway with my dad
I had the first of what have become multi-decade conversations
with my father about Middle Eastern politics.
It was that combination...a teacher who really saw that I was interested in the world,
who encouraged me, who gave me feedback, who spent extra time with me.
I spent seven years in the Bush administration working on Iraq and Afghanistan.
I currently teach in Cambridge, Massachusetts at Harvard University.
And I couldn't think of a better way to serve at this time of my life than to teach.
I'm no longer making decisions about national security myself,
but every year I'm teaching dozens of people
and hoping that they're a little better positioned to do what I used to do.
And that to me is still a serious service.
We need a new generation of teachers to join those already in the classroom.
Teach.