Favorite Teachers [View all]

[jeffrey_pdx]

I have two:

Mr. Tarasawa: He was the toughest teacher in our school. You couldn't show up late or skip class. He often would challenge the biggest guy in class to arm wrestle. If they won, we could work with a partner for quizzes. He never lost. The best thing about him, he knew what he was teaching. He taught AP Calculus, I went to college knowing and understanding more than most of my college freshmen classmates. On a personal level, he knew I didn't necessarily have to be listening to him if I knew what he was teaching so he left me alone, but he also knew if I didn't understand a concept, I would pay attention. Most of the time, I was working on the homework for the week while he was teaching the rest of the class. He passed away, I would have gone to the funeral if I was in town at the time.

Ms. Peters: She taught English and Literature. I had her for Modern American Literature my junior year of high school... "Catcher in the Rye", etc... What I remember about her was two-fold: "role-call": she'd come up with some random question you had to answer, ie, "what period in time would you most like to live?" (sometimes that was the entire class). I think I wasn't really on her radar until I lost my temper and defended my answer vehemently. Secondly: her taking her attendance sheets and hitting our vice principal in the chest with them in the middle of the hall during my lunch period. "If they're so important to you, then you fill them out." She was great, and the next year I was her classroom assistant/TA. She gave me her Grateful Dead tickets, which she usually had an essay contest for, and that pissed a lot of people off. But Ms. Peters never minded pissing someone off, me included.