SPANISH FORT, Ala. — Vanessa Pate fought the pull of the classroom for years, but in the end she couldn’t deny the calling that brought her most recently to Spanish Fort Elementary School.

“When I was a little kid, I always liked to play teacher, but I talked myself out of it as a job,” said Pate, SFES’s newest fourth-grade teacher.

Pate said teaching is more difficult than most people want to acknowledge, and the modest paychecks don’t, in themselves, provide adequate motivation.

“You can convince yourself of just about anything, but what it came down to in the end was I just got to the point where I felt like this was what I was supposed to do,” said Pate, who initially earned her bachelor’s degree in business management from the University of Mobile.

Editor’s Note: New jobs often bring challenges, but in educational settings they can also present opportunities for new arrivals to infuse schools with fresh perspectives and innovative approaches.

This is the sixth in an ongoing series designed to introduce readers to some new faces in the Spanish Fort feeder pattern.

See the rest of this story in the Sept. 17 Spanish Fort Sun—on stands through Sept. 21—and available at the Daphne Bulletin-Spanish Fort Sun office, 1805 Main St., Daphne.