The news is so challenging these days, I wanted to start something lighter. We all remember teachers (the good ones, the bad ones too). Join me making a list :
So mine would be
Mr Gracy, 7th grade social studies. He thought the dorky smart girl was cool, let me ask questions, sheltered me from bullies, and loved his subject.
Mrs. Niemeyer
4th grade
I was in her class her last year before she went on maternity leave. Stayed friends with her for many years afterwards. She would take me out to lunch sometimes with her baby, buy me great gifts, and treat me like an adult. Best thing she ever said (back in the 60’s) was telling my parents don’t worry if she has a terrible handwriting, she will learn to type fast! I still hang on my Christmas tree the wooden Raggedy Ann ornament she gave me that she hand painted and dated.
Mr. Lalich
AP US Govt/History
He was our senior class advisor, active in politics, wrote my college recommendations, expected us to do the work and his class was always fun. Treated us like adults, especially when we did stupid things so we’d know what repercussions looked like before they would really matter. Showed me what college would be like.
Sister Rose Aime, 4th grade.
At our parochial school in 4th grade, back in the early sixties science was added to your courses. The nuns were NOT good at science at all. Sister Rose Aime was different—she knew her stuff, loved to dazzle us with science demos.
Instantly my love of science was cultivated, it remained my favorite subject through HS, and I ended up a chemistry teacher as a result.
After a couple of years Sister was transferred to another convent (and school), and we left-brainers were CRUSHED.
I have two.
1 - high school PE. He recruited me to join the track team which led to my lifelong running hobby. He’s one of my 6 friends on Facebook. (Running joke in my IRL circle. I don’t do social media)
2 - calculus BC teacher. She was probably the best teacher I had. She made calculus seem so easy. I wasn’t sure how anyone could not understand it. Also - At our school calculus was either AB or BC. Not both. So she was our first introduction to calculus. The AP exam was the easiest standardized test I ever took thanks to her. And I’m sure made engineering school much easier for me
My high school English teacher. Because of our different system overseas and a small school, I had the same teacher from 7th-12th grade in all but one year (I think my 10th grade teacher was someone else). He was punctilious on grammar, supportive of expression in creative writing, but really lifted my love of reading onto a different scale with carefully chosen set works, and really got me understanding poetry. In a strange twist of circumstances, by the time D19 was near high school we were in a different city, but he was teaching at the high school she was going to be at and I was sooo hoping he would teach her too - how cool would that be? But then we emigrated to the US and he retired that same year too. He passed away from cancer a few years ago, and the outpouring on his Facebook page showed how widely loved he was over his decades of teaching.
Not sure if this counts but one of my second year economics lecturers brought a whole fresh approach to the subject and consolidated my love for the subject (which I was only doing initially because two years of economics were required for the degree I started). Partly thanks to him I changed my major to economics and never looked back.
I went to beauty school but ended up in college later on a fluke. I majored in English (earning a top score on that AP test proved useful) and have never forgotten her. She was such an encouragement and even visited me and my BF roommate (who was also in her AP class with me) our freshman year at Michigan. She was killed by her lover’s ex-wife several years after we graduated from college; the doorbell rang, she opened the door, and the ex shot her point blank. I went back to Michigan for her funeral. God love you and rest in peace, Judy. You made a huge difference in my life.
Clair McElfresh. He was our high school choir director and he was a fabulous mentor and teacher. I hope others here know him! Definitely a legend at our school.
High School Concert Choir Director. 110 members, auditioned at a HS with 3300 students at the time.
He cared about us as people, and he taught us a high level of music that I continued to sing many years later as an adult.
ETA…I could have graduated after 11th grade but didn’t want to give up that year with the choir.
My 1st grade teacher, Mrs. Manier. She put up with my shenanigans and alerted my parents to my learning disabilities.
I had horrible handwriting, so one day took my friends writing tablet, erased his name from the front, and put my name in his place. No memory what I did with my own tablet, but either way, Mrs. Manier was no dummy, and knew what I did! My friend, who was still a friend as an adult, still had great handwriting!
Everyone thought I was such a great reader, which in 1st grade back in the 60’s wasn’t required. Turns out I was just memorizing what I had heard and had a very small sight word recall. Spent years with a readying tutor, that wasn’t as helpful as it should have been. If I had had Mrs. Manier in 2nd or 3rd grade, she would have given me the help I needed.
Not a teacher but a camp counselor, Miss Shelley, who was kind to me at a time when I really needed it.
And I got to reconnect with her recently at a camp reunion, which was awesome!
While I remember lots of teachers names, I can’t say there is a huge stand out.
The one I’ll pick is Mr. Foster. Journalism and school newspaper advisor. He was also a big coach guy but I was NOT an athlete. He gave me lots of confidence in my writing and was very encouraging to pursue journalism in college. Which I did but only for a semester before switching majors. Which is probably best because my younger brother who I nurtured quite a bit went on to become a sort of known journalist!
Mr. Foster was a very large man with a very large heart.
Oh my gosh, that reminded me of a second grade teacher I had had for one term who probably saved a lot of grief for me. Back when and where I went to school, there was no testing for anything. My first grade teacher had told my parents I was probably “R-word”. I had been reading since I was 4, so my parents didn’t believe her, but no one really figured out what the issue was. They still let me pass first grade. I went to a different school for one term in second grade as we were temporarily in a different city. On my first day there, the teacher sent home a note for my parents: “get her eyes checked”. One pair of glasses later, the world was different. After that term we moved back to original town/school and I went from being “R” to “the best girl pupil” in second grade (yes, they had separate boys and girls prizes). I was best in grade for the rest of elementary school. I don’t remember much else about Miss Eliasov, but she was certainly life changing.
And this reminds me of my 4th grade teacher, who quietly finagled new reading materials for me once she determined I was not, in fact, faking reading considerably above the formatted readers provided.
Mrs. Frantz, fourth-grade English.
She had us read “real” literature, including memorizing Shakespeare. I can still do the balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet. She was the first teacher I had who really challenged us to think bigger.
Foreign language teacher who also sponsored the foreign language club, took us all to competitions, fun activities, welcomed us into her home for dinners. She was like a second mom, and she had two kids - one in my grade, one younger. Husband was a dean at a local university, so they highly valued education and she passed that along to all students, along with maternal warmth. I stayed in touch with her kids so I was told when she was diagnosed with cancer and not doing very well. I was able to write her a long letter telling her how much she had meant to me, for which I am thankful.
AP English lit teacher. She taught me how to write. In addition to research projects and literary analysis papers, we did many timed writings in class in preparation for the AP exam and she was a TOUGH grader. Just brutal. It was frustrating, but by the end of the class, I had become an organized, logical, and confident writer. This has served me well my whole life, as I have built on the skills she taught me. And I got a 5 on the AP exam. As a fun aside, she had also been Paul Reubens’s English teacher way back when. Unfortunately, I did not have a chance to tell her how much she had meant to me before she passed.
Miss Fisher, my 1st grade teacher. She challenged my reading comprehension, and I am forever grateful that she allowed me to move ahead when I was ready to do so. (SRA made that possible, btw.)
Mrs Kono, my 5th grade English teacher saved me after I was demoted from gifted English to her class because of too many absences for strep throat in 4th grade. She was kind to me and everyone. She read us all books aloud (like The Hobbit) and made the classroom much more welcoming that it would otherwise have been an even more awkward situation.
My 6th grade math teacher, Mr Higashi who had programmed texts in a box on a shelf that I could and did devour after finishing the homework. I taught myself Algebra so the following year when we had it taught via overhead projector by a teacher none of us could follow I was fine since I had learned it in 6th grade and tutored those around me.
Also Professor Kitzhaber who helped my polish my OWN written voice in college, unlike so many other teachers who just wanted you to mimic their voice. He also nominated me as outstanding SR woman with AUW and I won and attended a banquet (my boyfriend accompanied me and drove).
Mr House, 9th grade, AP bio. Helped me gain confidence and that carried me through HS and Cornell.
12th grade English teacher.
She had a way of seeing the absolute best of you, and believing in you. She made me believe in myself. I went to college feeling like I really could do literature well, that I could write and think and had stuff to say. That my ideas mattered. That I mattered.
Also, while visiting her house over the summer after graduation, (we all did because we all adored her and she put up with us), I met her kids-- four teenagers.
I subsequently started going out with, and eventually married, the oldest one 
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