The Ripple Effect

Fifteen years after her transformative summer at the ASP, teacher Shoshana Foster ASP’10 continues to inspire others.

BY LARRY CLOW

Shoshana Foster ASP’10 believes that even the smallest act can make a large, lasting impact. It’s a lesson that she’s learned countless times in her 11 years as an elementary school teacher, and one that she makes a point to pass on to her students.

“My mantra has always been that, even on the days when I feel like I’m not doing a good job or not getting the math lesson right, if I can make an impact on one of my students, that means everything to me,” she says.

It’s a feeling Foster is familiar with — she still looks back on the summer she took part in the Advanced Studies Program as a catalyzing experience that cemented her life-long love of education and continues to inspire her in the classroom and as a donor to the ASP.

“I really appreciated the idea of studying a topic just for the sake of studying and learning and asking questions,” she says. “It gave me this freedom to explore the things that interest me and ask questions about the world.”

Attending the ASP from Nashua High School South in 2010, Foster studied World Religions. She returned as a teaching intern in 2014 for Writing Workshop. Being around other students passionate about learning was magical, and the experience helped show her what teaching could be. “I use what I learned as an ASP intern all the time in my career. I’m given all these standards to teach, but I can bring my own creativity and flair into it.”

After graduating from Bates College in 2015, Foster joined Teach for America. After five weeks of training, she was placed in a third grade classroom in Hartford, Connecticut. Her first year of teaching was challenging, and Foster struggled. Was she connecting with students? Were they learning or even paying attention? On a particularly difficult day in the classroom, Foster asked her dean for help.

“She came to my class and said, ‘Ms. Foster, go out and get yourself coffee, these kids don’t want to learn.’ It was awkward, but she insisted, so I grabbed my bag and left,” she says. She was barely out of the building when her phone rang — it was the school nurse. “She said, ‘Where are you? I have one of your students in my office, and she’s afraid she’s never going to see you again.’”

Foster rushed back and comforted the student, and it was in that moment that she found her inspiration. “I kept showing up for this girl and for my other students,” she says.

Foster keeps showing up, both for her students and for future generations of New Hampshire students participating in ASP. She donates $18 to the program each year — a significant number in Judaism that means “life.”

“Though I’m on a teacher’s salary, I still want to give every year,” she says. “I believe so much in the ASP, and I want it to continue for years to come.” Even though it’s a small amount, Foster hopes that her gift’s effects ripple out. Maybe that $18 adds to a student scholarship, or helps to fund another course or bring a guest speaker to campus during the summer. “I tell my students that even the smallest thing can have a ripple effect,” she says. “My gift is a small offering for something I believe in so deeply.”