"Dreams save us. Dreams lift us up and transform us. And, on my soul, I swear, until my dream of a world where dignity, honor, and justice becomes the reality we all share, I will never stop fighting. Ever."

-Superman 



My decision to apply to the residency program and join AUSL was largely due to my experience with the young man to the right**. I met this student during my student teaching experience in Indianapolis, IN. A  quick narrative of the impact this student had on my life and how he helped shape me as an educator can be found in my initial AUSL essay that I wrote in order to gain entry to the residency program. This narrative can be found below.


**During my student teaching I obtained permission to use this student's photo

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" The ideas, skills, and activities taught in a well-rounded physical education program should reach far beyond simply teaching sports for sports sake."

Improv and theatrical performance has been an artistic outlet of mine for many years.  I have trained with Second City Chicago, the Improv Olympic theater, and Comedy Sports Chicago. I have found that the skills I have developed on stage directly correspond to life as an educator. Improv has taught me to always work with a team first attitude by having the team's success at the front of my mind. It also taught me to agree, explore, and heighten meaning that I am always receptive to new ideas and ready to pull from my own knowledge in order to contribute.

An obsession with health and strength training during my time in high school is what lead me into a career a physical educator. I spent eight years working at a local Charter Fitness (previously Cardinal Fitness) club and actively pursued an ACSM personal training certification. Not only does my history in strength training enhance my content knowledge related to PE, but  this obsession has also helped strengthen an already admirable work ethic and fostered my abilities to complete tasks and seek out information independently. Through my years at Charter fitness I developed a close relationship with my boss, Natalie Kaiser. Before Natalie's passing in December of 2012, she played a large role in helping me develop skills needed to effectively interact with the public in a customer service setting. Below you will find Natalie's letter of recommendation that she offered me as I departed Charter fitness and set out to find my Career. This letter of recommendation helps to further showcase who I am as a professional.

Scott Filline Letter of Recommendation.pdf Scott Filline Letter of Recommendation.pdf
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"My main priority is to impact my students' lives in such a way that they are able to impact their own"

 What do I now understand about my culture, privilege, and positionality and how these influence my teaching, as well as students’, community members’ and other educators’ perceptions of you? Which aspects are potential assets? Which are potential limitations? What will you do to mitigate those aspects and/or perceived aspects? 


First of all, I never realized that being a white man raised in a middle class family would be a detriment to my teaching effectiveness in the inner city. Initial, I refused to look at race as an issue. I really feel like I used to embody the “color blind” mentality outlined in Charles Payne’s, “So Much Reform, So little Change.” I thought that the key to success was a consistent teacher with a strong curriculum without recognizing glaring inequalities as a true detriment to education. A consistent teacher and a strong curriculum are, of course, very important points that contribute to effectively educating a child; yet, they are not the only factors at play in the urban environment.

It was important for me to realize that school does not necessarily mean the same thing to my students as it did for me back when I was in grade school. Through my studies and my experiences I have come to the conclusion the school can be an inherently oppressive system to some. Couple this with an already strong distrust of an educational system that has denied equal and quality education over the years and we have a clear picture of the battle we, the teachers, are fighting. I found this point reinforced in an excerpt we read from Everyday Antiracism. This excerpt stated that “Black parents’ distrust of white-run schools in rooted in generations of institutionalized policies and practices that have denied equal access to quality education… This distrust must be acknowledged and then countered with explicit efforts to build trust (Tatum, 2008).” I feel like this quote really represents what I needed to learn in order to be an impactful teacher in Chicago.

My intentions with teaching in the urban setting are rooted in a desire to give students some of the consistency and opportunities that I was given when I was growing up. Though, I am a white male from the suburbs. Recognizing the distrust that may exist is the first step towards combating it and gaining the trust of students, parents and community members. It is also extremely important that I am slow to judge in this situation. Not every parent is going to distrust me because of my upbringing or the way that I look, but I need to remain consistent with my interactions in a way that is sensitive to the issues that may be a detriment to me become in influential figure in the Chicago public school system.