Walt Scheider

The first I ever heard of The Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching was when I partnered with Walt Scheider.

I was in need of a cooperating teacher for my observation and student teaching assignments at The University of Michigan's School of Education. It was my senior year at Michigan. I had switched my major from Aerospace Engineering to Education (Physics Major/Math Minor) at the end of my sophomore year. There was some tumult involved in that road fork.

In any case, I was now on a path to become a high school physics teacher. On purpose. I needed a master teacher to work with. In an unusual embarrassment of riches, Michigan had two physics teachers-in-training that year. The routine was to work with the veteran teacher at Ann Arbor Pioneer High School.

But Dr. Jean Krisch, the best physics instructor I had at Michigan, told me about Walt Schieder. He was the physics teacher at Ann Arbor Huron High. Krisch's daughter had been a student in Scheider's class, and he came highly recommended. Although I did not set the river on fire in Krisch's Physics 401 course, I admired her immensely and set off to make arrangements with Scheider.

Walt Scheider held a Ph.D. in Biophysics from Harvard. He was a successful research scientist. One year—deep into his career—he turned down a $125,000 grant from the National Institutes of Health to go teach high school physics. So there he was at Ann Arbor Huron High.

It was about that time that PAEMST was born. Scheider applied that very first year. And he won. He deserved it. By all accounts, Walt Scheider was an outstanding physics teacher.

Two years later, I show up—unannounced—looking to horn in on his classes. "I don't think I can take a student teacher this year because I'll be carpooling," was his response to my proposal. I clearly came across as an intelligent, confident, well-prepared candidate. In reality, he never had a student teacher and wasn't necessarily looking to take one on.

But I was persistent. I somehow convinced him I wouldn't interfere with his carpooling agenda or permanently damage his students. I treasured the time I spent in the presence of this master. I soaked it in as best I could. He gave me very little time in front of the class. Arrangements were looser in those days, and I was something of a Guinea pig working with him.

What little time I did have in front of his classes was enough to point out—at least to me—that I wasn't as good as he was. I wanted to be that good. But I wasn't.

I feared that at the end of it all, he would counsel me into considering an alternate career path. Instead he wrote me a glowing recommendation that I did not feel worthy of. We kept in touch, off and on, for years after I moved out to California. He died just a few years ago.

Walt Scheider is a bright star in the constellation I use to steer the ship of my curriculum.

Nomination

I was nominated for the PAEMST in 2009 by California's 1989 PAEMST honoree in science, Steve Keith. I was flattered, but I did not apply.

I love what I do for a living and I take it seriously. Through the years, I have been recognized for excellence, but I had never applied for any such honor. I never aspired to be Teacher of the Year at any level. The only thing I ever envisioned being was Teacher of the... classes I teach.

Steve Keith was one of my official mentors when I arrived in Sacramento at the ripe old age of 21. I don't know how many times I turned to him in panic, but I sure was glad he was there to help.

Steve taught at Casa Roble High School: half a county away, but still in the sprawling San Juan  Unified School District. He led many physics-themed workshops in the popular Schools and Colleges for the Advancement of Teaching Science (yes, SCATS) program at CSU Sacramento. He was clearly passionate about physics. He was level-headed. He was a Mac user. He was a good guy.

As it turns out, he still is. All those things!

A few years ago, the Physics Teacher SOS New Teacher Workshop program that Paul Robinson, Stephanie Finander, and I were running expanded. We had been presenting exclusively at Robinson's San Mateo High School, but I was charged with mirroring the program out of my own school. I needed a partner to co-present the workshops. Steve Keith was the one guy I knew would be up for it.

He retired from the classroom a few years ago, but he's fit as a fiddle and remains a treasure-trove of pedagogical know-how and workshop presentation savvy. Having him on board meant we could run a PTSOS workshop series in Sacramento. The man would be worth his weight in gold if we measured his weight on Jupiter and the gold's weight on the Moon. Think about it!

In any case, he didn't give up on me. He nominated me again in 2011. The only way to stop him from this flattering nagging ("flaggering") was to apply for the dang thing. If I win, he was right and I get to meet the President! More likely I loose to a better-qualified candidate and he leaves me alone about PAEMST. Win-win!

About this blog

Blogs can be slighted as self-indulgent. As graffiti with punctuation. Written by people with too much time on their hands and read by people with too much time on their hands.

Fair enough.

A wise colleague once told me, "There is no history unless you record it."

This blog is my attempt to document my experience as an applicant for the Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching (PAEMST).

It will be my story of how I ended up in Washington, DC, being honored as one of the best science teachers in the United States of America. I have always acknowledged having an ego the size of Montana. Hence Phyz.org and The Blog of Phyz.

The Presidential Award is a singular event. Important enough (to me) to establish a separate blog for. I leave it to my gentle readers to decide how self-indulgent it is.

The plan is to document as much of this process as is practicable. Maybe post the application essay. Maybe post the submitted video. (I'll need help on that as I can't seem to successfully Handbrake the video off the DVD that my videographer student produced. Apparently it contains a bad "atom." Wha?) There will be photos and stories relating to the recognition program coming up in Washington. And after that, who knows?

Don't necessarily trust the post dates as the dates the posts were authored.