It’s been a nice, long summer, but the time has come to return to school. Time to wake up and get to the bus at 6:00 a.m., come home to a beautiful bed, and then return to your usual school year routines. But most importantly, it’s time to meet the teachers you’ll spend the next 180 days of your life with. If you’re attending Loy Norrix, there is an abundance of new staff members to meet.
Loy Norrix is in the middle of huge changes, everything from new rules to a $5.5 million school renovation. Including one of the biggest changes of all, brand new staff. Loy Norrix has hired a total of 23 new staff members (excluding security guards) for multiple jobs around the school. These jobs include, but are not limited to, teachers, assistant principals, special education personnel and even a new head coach for the football team.
Of course, with new teachers coming in, there are other teachers that had to step down. Several teachers decided to retire or move to different areas over the summer, leaving plenty of open positions.
“All the teachers’ positions, with the exception of a couple … were filling vacancies,” said Dean of Students, Christopher Aguinaga. “All the teachers had to be hired. It really wasn’t a choice because there were vacancies, either retirements or people moved to other places.”
To fill these vacancies, the staff went through, what Dean Aguinaga described as, a “community process.”
“They [the applicant] all start with a group of administrators, maybe someone from the Human Resources department, and in some cases we include teachers in this process,” said Aguinaga.
During the process, staff went through a series of questions and demo lessons, either here at Loy Norrix, or at a summer school program. Then the candidates were graded on a numerical scale by different staff members to decide how qualified they were for the position. This ensured that the best of the best were chosen for the open vacancies.
When asked whether or not he believes the new teachers will live up to their expectations, Dean Aguinaga simply replied, “I think they will,” quickly adding, “In fact, I think they might even exceed them.”
Despite being new to Loy Norrix, many of these staff members are experienced in their fields. Only several teachers are brand new to teaching. Many of the teachers are local or have been here for some extent of time, but a few are from far out of Kalamazoo.
Sarah Thomas, the new Algebra II teacher, talked about her previous teaching position in Tanzania, Africa, where she worked for 2 ½ years. She was not only teaching the children there, the children taught her as well.
“It’s been a lot different. My students there all had English as their second or third language, so they really taught me to speak slow and explain,” said Sarah Thomas.
According to sophomore Drake Olson, “She [Sarah Thomas] is a very good teacher. She’s new, so she doesn’t have all of her things [lesson plans] set how she wants it yet, so it’s a new experience each time we come into class,” Olson continued, “Everyone’s really into what she’s talking about and everyone participates in class.”
Jeffrey Pickell, the new 9th grade English Language Arts teacher who replaced John Kreider, also had previous teaching experiences. Pickell taught college freshman Writing Composition, a college sophomore level class, a college senior level creative writing class, and a college sophomore level American Literature survey. He mentioned the work here at Loy Norrix as plentiful, but refreshing and always keeping you ready.
“You’re always encountering new problems. You’re always finding new solutions. You’re always solving problems. There’s always something that’s on your plate,” said Pickell.
“The staff here at Loy Norrix is populated by the most compassionate, the most generous, the most talented, the most capable and, I think, the best morally all-around people I’ve ever encountered. I keep getting surprised very day by the generosity of the staff,” said Pickell.
Thomas has also had a great start to her time at Loy Norrix. Like Pickell, she has found the staff extremely supportive.
“It’s a very supportive school, there’s a lot of supportive staff members. It seems like there’s a lot going on at this school,” Thomas continued, “Another Algebra II teacher is Mr. Greeley, so I’ve been able to get some help from him with the curriculum and get a better idea from him. The teachers in the hallway have also been very helpful, especially Ms. Young. She’s my mentor teacher, so she’s been really helpful in understanding how this school works.”
Students and staff have taken their new teachers into consideration and have decided that helping and supporting them is a good first step. If this behavior continues, Loy Norrix will show how open it is to new ideas and people.
Pickell puts full focus into his thoughts, ending with a beautiful and important message.
“I think the most important thing to do for each other is to love each other. I think that we need to be good people to each other,” Picknell continued, “We need to raise each other up. We need to realize that we are of many different makes and models, that we come from many different backgrounds, but that we’re all part of the same family. We’re all part of the same community, we’re all brother and all sisters, and we need to reach out and love each other like brothers and sisters.”
List of New Staff (Excluding Security Guards)
April Alexopoulos Secretary
Carol Bouabdellaoui ESL Bilingual
Chad Brady Assistant Principal Grades 9-10
Melanie Burke ELA-Reading
Eric Davis Biology Freshmen Academy
Christie DeHaan Dean’s Secretary
Tamara Elliott Special Education
Terry Farmer Physical Education
Trisha Fires Special Education
Cheryl Knight Principal’s Secretary
Andrew Loy Special Education
Aaron Mirakovits Band
Jeffrey Pickell ELA Freshmen Academy
Zachary Rickli Attendance Interventionist
Samantha Simpson Special Education
Beth Soisson Business Education
Jonathan Sollinger Special Education
Li Sun Chinese
Sarah Thomas Math
Chaoying Wang Chinese
Donald Webster District Security Chief
Alexandria Williams Physics
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New Teachers on the Block
October 16, 2017
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About the Contributor
Brandon Schnurr, Web Editor
My name is Brandon Schnurr, and I've been with Knight Life going on three years. I started in the 2017-2018 school year as the News Editor of Knight Life, and continued into the 2018-2019 year as Web Editor, a position I still hold in the 2019-2020 school year as we move to a more web based platform. Besides Knight Life, I am also a member of the Loy Norrix Chapter of the National Honor Society. Some of my hobbies include video games, playing guitar, and singing.
