This summer, when I heard Kamala Harris was considering a former high school teacher as her running mate, I immediately wanted her to pick him — whoever he was.

As a former high school teacher myself, I instinctively trust teachers. They work hard and want the best for other people’s kids day after day, year after year. They devote their careers to creating powerful futures.

Teachers have the heart and vision for public office.

When Harris announced that she had, in fact, picked the former high school teacher, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, as her running mate, I was thrilled. Reading the news, I chanted: “Oh good oh good oh good oh good.”

Later that day, I saw on X that author Angie Thomas said something much more resonant.

“Tim Walz has big ‘favorite teacher’ energy.”

She’s right. And I believe that’s exactly what America needs right now.

When I hear “favorite teacher,” I automatically think of mine: Ms. Lardieri, the nature-loving, confidence-building woman who taught me in the fourth grade. At 40, I still get emotional about her, the first person who made me believe I could be a writer.

Whenever my students, my lovelies, called me their favorite teacher during my career teaching English, it humbled me. Thanks to Ms. Lardieri, I know the power of a favorite teacher. The impact they leave. The trajectory they can help set us on.

Favorite teachers change lives.

Even just a brief bio of Walz shows that’s exactly what he did. The same year he helped coach the football team to its first state championship, he also signed up to be the adviser of the school’s first gay-straight alliance.

In her speech introducing Walz to the American people, Harris described these parts of Walz’s past, and his reactions to her words crystallized his commitment to his students. Twenty-five years after the fact, he still raised his arms in triumph at the mention of his team’s win. When, just a moment later, Harris said “Tim knew the signal that it would send to have a football coach get involved” with the gay-straight alliance, he bowed his head, hands folded, as if humbled by that opportunity. I got chills witnessing this, knowing, if Walz’s reactions are this pronounced decades later, his students undoubtedly felt his dedication back then.

The next day, at a rally in Wisconsin, Walz stopped his speech when he noticed someone overheating. Watching how instinctively he paused his agenda for the sake of someone else’s well-being, I knew he must’ve run his classroom the same way.

During the recent vice presidential debate, we saw even more glimpses of what Walz was like in the classroom. He set high expectations — perhaps even higher than the recipients of those expectations (in this case, Sen. J.D. Vance) had for themselves. Walz masterfully prioritized concerns in an instant, sometimes dismissing Vance’s lies with a single sentence. He contained his frustration and proceeded with composure rather than losing his cool, or focus, despite Vance’s numerous egregious comments.

In fourth grade, my class had a monthly assignment of reciting a poem of our choosing in front of the class. I’ve had social anxiety my whole life but, because of Ms. Lardieri, I’m comfortable with public speaking. To highlight how arbitrary gender discrimination is, she let the girls in my class wear baseball hats in school; when any of the boys complained that that wasn’t fair, she would calmly cite one of the numerous advantages given to boys and men. Ms. Lardieri challenged us regularly but never without our best interest in mind. Never without her support.

The power of a favorite teacher is their ability to make us try harder and do more than we may initially want. Because they believe in us and prove they care, we’re often willing to do, to be, better. When I hear Walz speak, I know that he had that exact effect on his students. And, because he has the same investment in Americans as he did in his students, I believe that, if given the chance, Tim Walz could help America do, be, better.