Many teachers have a passion for the subjects they teach, leading them to participate in jobs and activities outside of school in their areas of interest. There are countless teachers who fit this description, but here is a look at a few of these teachers who truly practice what they teach.
Leah Enright, Spanish
Leah Enright, Spanish teacher, has had many job opportunities, thanks to her mastery of Spanish, which keep her speaking Spanish during and outside of class.
“I’ve been a court interpreter; I started that when I was in college; anything from basic traffic violations through DUI and I was on a case for drug trafficking once,” Enright said. “I have worked for Sara Lee, the bakery company; they needed their recipes translated. I have taught Spanish for CLC, both as credit and adult continuing education.”
Enright said she was also the voice heard during safety procedures on airplanes for Apple Vacations, who needed a Spanish recording.
“[I recorded the] safety script, when the flight attendants go through the safety procedures,” Enright said. “I was at the right place at the right time. I started talking to somebody about the fact that I spoke Spanish and they happened to work for the company. They passed my name along and they called me.”
Enright likes to do these extra jobs because they are “financially a good decision,” which was especially helpful in college, she said. Enright takes advantage of opportunities that her talent at Spanish provides.
“[Speaking Spanish is] a specialty. A lot of people either don’t use their natural ability or don’t use the fact that they are bilingual to their advantage,” Enright said.
Enright became bilingual after starting Spanish in high school. During her sophomore year, she had a teacher who inspired her and she tries to incorporate the things she admired in her old teacher into her own teaching.
“If I don’t think that [the class material] is quality or I don’t think that it’s enticing, inviting, exciting, then there’s no way my students will,” Enright said. “The more that you consider what’s best for students the better your lessons are going to be. If you’re having an off moment, or a bad day or you don’t know what to plan for the next day or the next week, if you just keep in mind what’s best for the students, then you can’t go wrong.”
Jennifer Gira, English
Jennifer Gira, English, teaches Creative Writing and to help her with this, she does some creative reading and writing of her own. She has also gone through extra schooling in her subject.
“I got my Master’s degree in creative writing. After that I took more graduate classes and most of them have been in English,” Gira said. “I read a lot and I write in my free time. I’ve sent a couple things [for publication], but I haven’t had anything published. I just have a collection of pieces I’ve started and the goal is to keep sending things.”
Gira reads and writes in her free time to grow as an individual, but doing so also helps her gather material for her classes, she said.
“I think I look at writing like people would look at art or music. I like the craft of it and like trying to do that myself,” Gira said. “I probably write once every couple weeks right now. I do a lot of reading for Creative Writing, just trying to find new poems and stories.”
Another way Gira’s outside work helped with her classes was she experienced a student’s revision process.
“I’ve had to do readings in public of my own work,” Gira said. “I’ve had to revise my own drafts and get feedback on those, so I think that helps me understand the process that students go through – the fears, and the good parts.”
John Keyzer, Science
John Keyzer, technology education teacher, teaches a variety of classes in his subject and is the faculty sponsor and mentor for the technology club.
“I formed the technology club in the spring of 2007,” Keyzer said. “Originally we didn’t have any limitations on what we were going to do. We got approached by some people from the FIRST Robotics Competitions and that was really interesting to the kids, so that’s what we decided to do.”
Keyzer says he sees many benefits in the classroom from this club because the students can apply their knowledge and learn more about the field.
“[The club] gives students an opportunity to have experiences that they wouldn’t have in the classroom,” Keyzer said. “The big thing is, during a robotics competition, they work with mentor engineers and it gives them a lot of exposure to different engineering fields.”
These experiences positively affect the students, as well as Keyzer, in and out of the classroom.
“I’m able to use a lot of the relationships I have with our mentors to shape my curriculum for my engineering classes,” Keyzer said. “Also, it’s a big source of motivation for me to see students apply what they’ve learned in the classroom, in a real world situation.”
Keyzer uses what learns outside of class to update his classes. He is always examining his curriculum, finding where there is room for improvement.
“[The revision process] is ongoing; I’m always updating my curriculum,” Keyzer said. “Basically, during a unit, I’ll take notes on how things went, observations I had and I’ll make changes accordingly.”