An Introduction to Me
So let’s begin at the beginning! Why am I starting this blog? After all I really know nothing about blogs so why do I think I should write one? The answer is simple I am beginning this blog because my niece thinks I should! Over the last several years she and I have engaged in many long conversations about situations she finds herself in and how she might best navigate them. I have always been there to give her the insights from my own life experiences and she believes that maybe those insights may be helpful to others as well. Hence she has suggested that I begin this blog with that hope in mind! And so I have decided to try to my hand at this newfangled mode of communicating with the world at large in the hope that I might touch at least one life out there in a positive manner!
If I hope to reach out to people and expect anyone to listen then I think I must first let them know who I am in terms of my life history and development so they can see if they think I might have something valuable to share with them. So I submit to you the following about myself.
Growing up in northern Idaho
I am a white male only 3 months shy of reaching my 80th birthday. I was born in a small town in northern Idaho the fourth of five siblings. My father was a immigrant from Cornwall who worked as a mine assayer and my mother was an immigrant from Canada with a Scottish mother and Irish father. Hence a I am a first generation American who currently holds citizenship in the U.S., Canada, and Ireland.
I grew up in the 50s and 60s which meant free to wander and explore and interact with my neighbors and cousins and friends pretty much unfettered by adult interference or supervision during free time! It is a luxury that is no longer available to kids today which in many ways is unfortunate.
I was raised Catholic by my mother and attended church regularly and catechism classes weekly. I served as both an altar boy and lector from the time I was 13 until I left for college. From the time I was in junior high until I left for college I lived with my paternal grandmother two doors down from my family home to provide her with company and monitor her health and wellbeing.
I was student body president of my junior high as a ninth grader and in high school I was active in a wide variety of clubs and also was on the debate team and participated in school plays. My senior year I was student council president as well as president of Science Club, DeDraDec (a club for participants in DEbate, a
DRAma, and DEClamation), Pep Club, FTA (Future Teachers of America). I was always chosen to lead most any group I was a part of and learned early on that a good leader was one who listened and delegated and gave credit where credit was due.
College and the classroom
I graduated from Kellogg High School first in my class in 1964 and was accepted at Gonzaga University in Spokane, Washington where I completed my Bachelors degree in Mathematics in 3 and a half years and then earned my teaching credential the final semester of my senior year. I minored in English and Philosophy with extensive work in Theology. While at Gonzaga I lived in Alliance House all four years which provided me with extensive interaction with foreign students.
Alliance House was named for the Alliance for Progress program created by President Kennedy to reach out to the countries south of our border to enhance understanding and cooperation. Each American student in Alliance House had a foreign student roommate. Mine were from El Salvador, the Netherlands, and Brazil (I was a resident assistant my senior year so lived alone). I was in the Honors Program and an active member of the interscholastic debate team which provided me with many opportunities to travel in the western United States.
Upon graduating from Gonzaga I took a teaching job in Denver, Colorado at a junior high in the heart of Denver’s black community. I had limited contact with African Americans growing up so this was an eye opening experience for me and one I tried to navigate with empathy and understanding. In spite of my naivete I was able to successfully connect with many of my students and formed a warm and caring relationship with them.
This was in 1968 when the civil unrest was intense and the Black Panthers were in ascendency! I actually arrived in Denver while the Democratic Convention in Chicago was happening with all the riots and upheaval which made working in my school particularly difficult. The Black Panthers threatened to shut us down because our staff was majority white while the student population was 85% black and they thought we were not equipped to deal with our students because of our race!
It was a very tough year but I stuck it out even after having been stabbed on my way home from school one day and having to be subjected to accusations of racism! It was a valuable lesson in dealing with adversity which contributes to my understanding of interpersonal and group relationships and I am glad for having had the experience although I would not wish for anyone to have to endure what I did that year.
I left Denver after the school year and moved to Sacramento to teach in a middle school in the heart of redneck country. What a change from where I had been! I had not settled in when I was met with an accusation of inappropriate conduct with a student and relieved of my teaching duties while an investigation unfolded. It only lasted one day and I was completely exonerated but it demonstrated to me the fragility of my profession and the need to be mindful of my every move!
During the three years teaching at the middle school I earned a Masters Degree in School Counseling from the local university and transferred to a different middle school to teach math half time and do personal counseling the other half time. I did this for eleven years before transferring to a local high school to teach mathematics. I spent twenty years there teaching all levels of mathematics from general math to precalculus.
During those years I was also a member of the site council and of the district’s labor management council. When asked what I taught my standard response was “I teach students”! I responded that way because I firmly believe that as a teacher my primary responsibility was to teach the students to become the best version of themselves they could be and that mathematics was simply one vehicle to do so! Jerry Brown in his first stint as governor of California was correct when he said that teachers although underpaid got their real reward psychically and he was right!
To be a teacher is an honor and a privilege and truly a chance to spread goodness into the world long after you are gone! I was lucky to have done so for 35 years and if writing this blog gives me the opportunity to continue to make a positive difference for even one more person then this will be an honor and privilege to do so! So I do not know where this will go but if you are intrigued enough to join me we will start a new adventure together and hopefully make the world a little better place for us having been in it!
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