When asked what I want to do with my life I often feel conflicted about how to respond. On the one hand I want to pursue my passion for education and become a teacher, and on the other I want to follow my dreams and artistic passion to become an actor and comedian. These are both dreams of mine and I really cannot decide which one I would rather pursue. When it came time to design my senior project I wanted to find a way to explore both of my interests. To engage my interest in education I am going to work at the Center School, a progressive public middle school on 84th street. There I will be assisting in classrooms and learning the trade. I hope to get a sense of what it will be like to be a teacher in the future. My other interest is mainly in standup comedy, to engage this interest I am planning to perform at comedy open mics and talk to people I know who are already established or semi established comedians. Spending time in comedy clubs will help me hone my skills and build my act as well as allow me to get a sense of the industry. The beauty of the project lies not in either piece but in the way they interact with each other. Pursuing comedy can be a risk, which is why it is important to have another job or something to fall back on–in my case, that job is teaching. Managing both a job and a comedy career can be challenging but I think this experience will give me a chance to test that balance. The other benefit of doing comedy and teaching is that often in comedy it can be difficult to come up with material to fill a set, however working in a school will hopefully provide me with plenty of opportunities to observe comical situations. My plan for the result of this project comes in two layers. I have what I am calling my “goals for myself” and what I am calling “measure of success.” The measure of success is how I will deem whether this project has been a success or a failure. I am measuring my success by whether or not I have learned from the experience, if I am able to learn something about teaching, and being a teacher, and if I can learn something about comedy from my time in clubs I will consider this project a success. To achieve these goals I will need to challenge myself, for we never learn if we do not challenge ourselves, if I do not learn it means I have not pushed myself to learn and that, I will consider a failure. My goals for myself are a set of goals I would like to achieve by the end of the project. My goals are to be a “good teacher” whatever that may mean, and to create a ten minute set that I can consistently perform.