Never Working Where You Live

I began my student teaching at Highland High in Pocatello in January of 1979. Some of my friends told me how tough it would be to teach at such a "rough" school. I enjoyed it. I learned some basic principles of maintaining a classroom--you never put up with Monkey Business, you begin as soon as the bell rings, you never allow students to sit for long periods of time. Those three things were keys to working successfully in a classroom, and when I finished my student teaching in Pocatello, I felt really good about what I accomplished, and then I began student teaching in Malad. While at Highland High School, I met a teacher, who taught my dad when he was in high school. The teacher was one who made a real difference in Pocatello, and my dad really liked him as an instructor.

One day I made an effort to talk to him and get some advice. "Never teach where you live," he said. "And if you decide to teach in Malad, make sure you establish yourself somewhere else first. It would be important to work at least four or five years and then go there if you really felt that is what you want to do."

I did not listen to him.

My classroom was at the bottom, it was in the basement of the building. In this picture, it appears they removed the windows and replaced them with coverings that prevented people from entering the building. I always found that to be the ultimate paradox about young people. All day at school they look for reasons not to be in school or in class, and then they try to break in at night.

I taught in my old German teacher's room, something that made me so proud, and I met her once and was able to talk about how happy it made me to think I could work in her classroom, but the advice I did not take was something that made a difference in my career. I hated my first three years. Being a teacher in Malad meant being subjected to eggs being thrown at your house every Halloween. After my third year, Ann and I had a fireplace built on a wall in our house. We were so proud of it. The loan we signed was a lot of money for us, and on Halloween, three young men tossed two or three dozen eggs down the chimney. For two years, I could smell egg every time it rained. I hated teaching in that town. And sadly, it was the one where I felt such a strong connection. I grew up there. My Annie grew up there, and our children grew up there too.

In our second home, we returned from a trip to Disneyland at 2:00 a.m. Some students dumped trash and leaves and straw all over my front steps, piling it up to the mail slot. They stuck materials into the mail slot, which spilled onto the floor of my house. It took me a week to trap the seven or eight mice in my house that the situation allowed while we were gone. And when I removed the straw and trash, there was a dead porky pine in the materials.

In the spring, my German exchange school arrived. One German student came four years in a row, and after the second visit, I changed her host family, because they would not make any restrictions about a curfew for our visitors. It became a problem. The American student and her mother poured a quart or more of honey on my new car, damaging the paint. I began looking seriously for a job that year. I had an offer in Box Elder School District to teach German at the high school, but they would not talk about hiring my Annie, which was silly. Our future districts found both of us to be excellent additions to their faculties. Actually it was a blessing to be further north. The job in Idaho Falls was a keeper, and Bonneville School District made offers to both of us in the spring of '88. It was such a blessing to leave.However, working in Malad made me tough as nails. It taught me how to deal with creepy people. I overheard a counselor speaking with a visiting adult who just moved into my last school where I worked. "That's Mr. Ward," he said. "He doesn't take crap from anybody." That's what teaching in Malad did for me. I was not mean or difficult for students. They enjoyed my classes. It is just that I was ready for anyone who entered my classroom with the intention to distract others.

I never looked to make things difficult for anyone, but I did not allow anyone to make things difficult for me either. There are some things that make me proud of what I did as a teacher besides the honors and accolades I achieved: first, when I left Malad some people, including teachers and the superintendent asked me to rethink my decision, second, the administrator who purposely made things difficult for me felt the effects of karma. A few years later my dad told me that he had it from a very good source that that man's lack of ethics in how he treated me cost him the superintendency. Third, when my cancer forced me to retire, two administrators from my district north of Idaho Falls visited me in my home. At the time, my doctor told me I had two weeks to two months to live. One begged me to return, because he wanted me to teach his son. The other told me that he always respected me because I told him and others exactly what I thought, whenever they needed my input. "If we didn't want to hear the truth, we shouldn't have asked you the question," he said. And two principals visited me and asked me to return too--one when I was very sick, and a second one came to my home a year later, hoping I could return to work. It feels good to be appreciated. When I was sick, students called me on the phone and visited me at home. For a long time, I saw former students where ever I went in the Idaho Falls area, and they told me what a difference I made in their lives. I have been away five years now, and the students are now doing what they do as adults in many different cities and states. Once in a while, I regret not studying law, because my professors at the university wanted me to do that. Memories of my students telling me how I helped them lets me know how lucky I am to have been a teacher. I hate cliches, but to use one by saying "to make a long story short," Malad made me tough enough to succeed anywhere, and I did. And my Annie did too. I hope the day arrives when I do not feel what I do about my hometown. That will be the day I return, because after all, my Annie and I do have a burial plots there.