It was a hot August day in 2002 when math teacher Meghan Pickett was administering her first test of her teaching career at Shoreline Middle School in Santa Cruz, where Pickett taught Algebra 1.

She was nervous, but reasoned that things would run smoothly. She completed what would become her permanent system to make a test: she made it, printed it out, edited it and timed herself completing the test to ensure a smooth test for the students. But she had forgotten to remove the answer key to the test from the top of the stack.

“I passed out the key to the very first person, and by the time I got to the second row, the sweet girl pointed it out,” Pickett said.

Pickett quickly retrieved the key and gave her a new copy, this time a copy of the actual unit test. However, Pickett couldn’t help but dwell on her mistake.

“I was new to teaching, and I wanted to look like I knew what I was doing,” Pickett said.

Since then, she has has gained a lot of confidence and despite having taught at three schools in the last 15 years, Pickett has adapted to each of them quickly.

These days, she keeps her answer keys in a different binder.

“[The incident] made me realize that I need to be thoughtful on how to create these systems so that I don’t make too many mistakes,” Pickett said.

Regardless of how much time has passed since this mistake, Pickett is grateful for the honest student who gave her the test back.

“That is one of the great things about teaching: you [get to] work with such nice people,” Pickett said. “It doesn’t seem that embarrassing, but it is something I will never forget.”