180 Days (History, Heroes, and a Hometown Feeling)

Jack Padgett became a teacher to change the world. He knew the risks - the low pay and long hours of being a teacher in North Carolina, but with a faith forged in fire he was going to be the best teacher God would allow. With his wife Sophie deployed to Afghanistan and a new teaching job in hand, Jack set out to work. Not all is as well as it seems. Jack learns very quickly the hardships a first-year teacher in North Carolina faces, such as disrespectful students, obsessive parents, and an administration that never wanted him in the first place. His faith is tested when he is diagnosed with brain cancer and his wife is critically injured while deployed. As his life withers away from cancer and the soul-sucking job of teaching, Jack wonders if there was any point to it at all.