The Echo recently conducted “Fast 5” interviews with teachers who are new to this building. We’re looking forward to having them in our classrooms and appreciated their responses to the following questions. If you are new to our building and would like to be featured, please email us your responses to the following questions at [email protected]

1. How do you like the high school so far?
2. How did you get into teaching?
3. What’s the toughest thing about your subject?
4. What’s the best thing about your subject?
5. Can you share a little known fact about yourself?

Ms. Herz
I love teaching in the high school. It is nice to see so many familiar faces of students I have taught in the past. I have always wanted to become a teacher. I love helping others become the best they can be!

I decided to become a Special Education Teacher after volunteering one summer at a school in Plainview for students with special needs.

As a Special Education teacher I do not have one specific subject area. Instead, I have been trained to be flexible and able to adapt to just about any situation thrown my way.

The best thing about teaching in multiple grade levels and subjects areas is working with other amazing teachers, being able to learn something new everyday, and the ability to try out new technology with older students.

A little known fact about myself is that I am a creative person. I love to create, bake and cook!

MS. SCOCA
I am not new- I am returning from my first year 5 years ago when I was teaching photography here! I am enjoying the high school so far- wish I was getting the full experience 🙁 but so far so good.

I got into teaching very last minute my senior year of high school. I had to drop a double period class and decided to take 2 art classes in place (senior mentality- easy A). I wanted to own a restaurant and my mom said I should follow another passion of mine so it would be easier to raise a family – so I chose art!

The toughest thing about my subject is finding ways to motivate and encourage my students on all levels of skill.

The best thing about my subject is I get to meet and teach most of the students in the building.

A little known fact about myself is that my personal artwork outside of school is all inspired by Cows! 🐄

MR. NEWMAN
Of course I miss the second home I had at the middle school, but I am now teaching here in the new wing, and it is beautiful. It is nice to see some of my old students in the hallways, and I can get to know new people here as well. Having a little change every now and then can be a good thing.

I always enjoyed math when I was in school, and I also enjoyed helping other people as well. I saw some of my friends had problems with math, and I tried to help them whenever I could. I just knew that between how much I enjoyed math, and how much I helped other people being successful at it – it would just be a good fit for me to become a math teacher.

The toughest part about being a math teacher is when students come into class with a negative mindset about math. Some students think they will never understand math, or they hate math because of past experiences, but I try to encourage all of my students to start off fresh even if they didn’t have success in the past, and most of the time they see that they actually can be successful in math.

The best thing about my subject is that I can share my love of math with my students. Math is like a puzzle and we need to find the right pieces to solve the puzzle, and once you have all of the necessary pieces you can solve all different types of puzzles. Another thing that is great about math is, there is always a correct solution, but there may be several different methods to arrive at that solution. I like to see when students come up with different ways of solving the same problem.

Although some people already know about this – many do not. I have been trying to teach myself Spanish for the last year and a half. It is a slow and difficult process, but I have really been enjoying the journey.