Interview Transcript

When did you decide you wanted to be a teacher?
I have always had two dreams for my career…One, to be a Television News Anchor and the other to be a teacher. When I was in college I had to decide which I wanted to do and determined that being a TV News Anchor could force me to live further away from my family than I wanted. So, I went for my other dream, to be a teacher. I had thought I would become an English teacher, but after really thinking about the classes that I most enjoyed in high school, I realized that Government, Psychology, and Sociology were my favorites. So, I decided to go into social studies (I still do not really enjoy history though). Today, I still sometimes wish I would have become a News Anchor, but most of the time I LOVE my job as a teacher. I always knew that I wanted to work with high school students too, not elementary. Many people think that is odd and that I would be better suited to elementary aged students. But, I know that I do not have enough patience to deal with elementary!

What college did you go to and what was your major?
I went to Concordia College in Moorhead, MN. I majored in Social Studies Education, with an emphasis on Political Science. I also have a master’s degree from Saint Mary’s University. The Master’s is in Teaching and Learning.

How many different schools have you taught at? Which was your favorite?
I first taught in New Ulm, MN at the high school. I was only there for one year (it was my choice to leave). Then I taught at White Bear Lake High School, South Campus (just 11th and 12th grades). I taught in WBL for 2 years and was let go due to budget cuts. Finally, I came to Princeton High School. I am in the middle of my 8th year at Princeton. Favorite…hmm…Not New Ulm. I really liked teaching in WBL, but I also like Princeton. I like both for different reasons. I’m not sure I could pick a favorite between the two!

How did working at PHS through ARCC come along?
My first year in Princeton I began teaching 9th grade and 11th grade. Half way through the year one of our senior teachers (he was my Gov’t & Psych teacher when I was in high school) was assigned an administrative position that he moved into in January. Due to this someone needed to take over his classes (he taught the concurrent enrollment classes at PHS…College Psych & College Gov’t.). At the time, there was no member of our department that was qualified to actually teach these classes. He, however, felt that I would be the best fit and no one else wanted to take on these classes (everyone else enjoys history and would rather not teach Psych and Gov’t). He then got the requirements waived as long as I started taking classes to fulfill the requirements to teach concurrent enrollment classes. He then worked as my mentor while I began teaching these classes half way through the year. I also started working on my Master’s degree so that I could actually qualify to teach the classes.

What is your least favorite part of teaching college courses at High School?
I do not like that I am somewhat separate from my department members. No one else teaches the classes that I teach, so I do not have anyone to get ideas from or share experiences with. For example, at the current time my department is working on writing up new course outlines and everyone is able to work with at least one other person on this, except for me. I also do not really like that I have to be observed more than my colleagues. I get very nervous when I am observed by other adults and I have to get observed by my mentors at ARCC in each of the areas that I teach a coup le times a year. The observations always go very well, so I am not sure why I get so nervous…I guess it is just my personality (high anxiety)!!!

What is your favorite?
I love that I get to work with the “high flyers” at the high school. I get the students that are more academically minded. I very rarely have any behavior issues. I also do not have to attend many IEP meetings (special education). My students are the best in the school and I love working with them!

What college courses are you teaching right now?
At the current time I am just teaching two College Government courses (American Politics & Government POLS 1111). I will begin teaching College Psychology next trimester too (General Psychology PSYC 1110).

About how many students are taking the college classes through high school?
In College Government I have a total of 44 students at the current time between the two classes. In college psych I will have a total of 50 students in Psych. Those students overlap quite a bit, as you know though.

Have you ever considered being a professor on a college campus?
Not at this point in my life. One of my Mentors from ARCC tried to convince me that being a professor would be better for my family and me. However, I just have no interest in being a professor. I love working with high school students and I love the community that you get at a high school. I enjoy all the fun things that happen in a high school (homecoming, pepfests…). I also love working with seniors. They are always so excited to be seniors, but nervous to move on to the next step in their lives. I like to think that I help students through this process. I also do not think that I could be serious enough to be a professor, maybe this is a stereotype? I like doing silly things in class and like doing fun activities. I had one mentor for College Gov’t that was always jealous of the fact that I had time to do fun activities like the Supreme Court simulation. He said he just wouldn’t be able to fit that into his schedule.

What would be some pros and con’s of moving to a college campus?
Pros: more serious students, fewer interruptions to the classroom, more time to spend with my family, more time to prep for the classes that I teach

Cons: older students, more serious…maybe I’ll come up with more later



Where do you see yourself with your career in 5 years?
In 5 years I think I will still be teaching at the high school. I will probably be back to working full time (at the current time I work just .67 of a full time schedule – I do this to spend more time with my family and take my daughter to her medical and therapy appointments). I will probably be teaching both college and regular high school classes. I hope to move more in the direction of teaching teachers best practice methods as well (just teachers in the Princeton district).

Ten years?
10 years from now (well I’ll be old ;-)). Probably some of the same…I would like to have taken more psychology courses, maybe have a master’s degree in psychology or working towards a masters in psych at least. Continuing to try to be the best teacher I can be. Maybe one day I will move to a college campus or maybe move into becoming a high school counselor? Or the other route would be to work in the political Science field. Maybe I will run for office sometime? Who knows? The future is open to many new and exciting things!

Covering an event

After spending a full year on the Anoka-Ramsey Community College Campus, I thought it might be fun to cover an event from a different college. I focused on finding an organizations event that I felt strongly about. Searching through the many events held on the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus I found one that stood out.

Wisconsin Student Climate Coalition, otherwise known as WiSCC to the organizations members, held an event at a park downtown Madison, WI to try to recruit new members and let the group be known to new students.

WiSCC is a student organization that has many different leaders throughout all of the University of Wisconsin campuses. Their main focus is to introduce statewide climate change legislation and prevent global warming in everyday lifestyle changes.

At the park there were many snacks and appetizers for all the attendees. Everything was served on recycled paper plates, including the fan favorite large slices of delivered pizza. What better way to get college students to attend than free food?

For the first 30-minutes everyone mingled and enjoyed the food while looking over the printed brochures and handmade posters, which were all made on recycled paper. The written information was just a generalization of what was going to be touched on more in the meeting.

Once everyone got started, Laura stood in front of the large group of students to say a little bit about what the organization was all about. It was easy to tell how passionate Laura was about doing everything possible to prevent, or halt, global warming.

After expressing her strong feelings, Laura continued on by explaining the current project throughout the entire organization. Laura stated how right now WiSCC is “working on a petition drive to collect 10,000 postcards this semester across the state. The postcard states an increase of our renewable energy standard to 25%, and a reduction of carbon emissions 20% by 2020 and 80% by 2050.”

The crowd seemed to be into this project, it seemed simple enough to contribute. The few that were in an earshot from me definitely wanted to participate and learn more.

After the speech any interested members were welcome to go ask one-on-one questions with any present member. The numbers of curious students was larger than I had expected.

Many campuses do have organizations to protect the earth, which I think is a great and needed thing. The simple changes that WiSCC pointed out made it seem like everyone could contribute. Some ideas they shared included: buying recycled notebook paper, not using paper plates and plastic forks for everyday use, and energy conservation.

Attending this meeting was inspiring to make sure everyone does their part to get involved in saving our Earth.

Book prices drop, and continue to drop

The large store chain, Target, has recently joined Wal-Mart and Amazon.com in the price markdown on their books. This battle between stores is not only leaving other major bookstores, such as Boarders, low on business. But also authors salaries are expected to drop.

startribune.com

Obituary

Cassandra Pettit, an ARCC student, died suddenly on Tuesday at the age of 19.

Pettit was attending ARCC to get her Associates of Arts Degree, with plans to transfer to University of Wisconsin-Madison. Pettit had always dreamed about being a child psychologist, and hoped to be involved with helping troubled children.

When Pettit was not doing schoolwork she spent many hours at her full-time job that she loved. She was a team leader at The Buckle, Pettit thought very highly of all her coworkers and loved the job.

Pettit was getting excited for the upcoming basketball season, and was hit by a drunk driver after purchasing season tickets to the UW Badger Men’s Basketball 09-10 season.

Open visitation will be held this Saturday at the Princeton Funeral Home, followed by the funeral Sunday afternoon at the Princeton Church.

Cassandra Pettit is survived by her parents, Jay and Pam, sister, Chelsea, Grandparents, aunts, uncles, and multiple close friends.

Fatal situation in Texas

Texas man faces multiple drug charges after being found in a closet with a deceased man. The homeowner seen signs of forced entry and found they two men in closet. After being tested it was clear drugs were involved. Clueless homeowner found the two in the closet, one man sleeping the other dead.

Startribune.com

Story 4

Letting your imagination run wild

Many authors have influenced inspiring storywriters all around the world. Author, Jude Watson, has clearly impacted Hannah Schott, an ARCC student. “Jude Watson, has taught me so many life lessons,” Schott said about her favorite author.

Through reading stories Schott has developed a love of story writing. She said her favorite thing about story writing is being able to “control the lives of my characters.”

“I made up stories before I could read or write. If I don’t have a story swimming around in my mind, I’m not happy.” Schott does not remember how her passion for story writing developed. “Stories live inside me. I had to learn how to read and write, though. I can remember not being able to read. It was frustrating.”

Now that Schott is taking three college courses she still finds time to let her imagination run free while she writes. “I can make up nuns, CIA agents, cooks, aliens or whoever and create their life stories.”

“Stop Team Tylenol” is Schott’s favorite story. “The story kind of named itself because it is based on a NASCAR commercial that showed five NASCAR drivers discussing how to stop ‘Team Tylenol Racing.’”

Schott plans to continue with writing, even on a professional level. “I want to publish stories someday, hopefully soon. I hope my four crazy NASCAR stories are never published, they’re too weird. But I have written some other stories that I have high hopes for.”

Keep an eye out for Hannah Schott stories in bookstores soon.

Interview

What are your top 3 hobbies? My top three hobbies would probably be playing
sports, playing the piano, and listening to music.

Out of those 3 which one is the most meaningful to you? And why?
Playing piano is my most meaningful hobby. I love music, so when I am able to
simply sit down and start making music myself it is very meaningful and has a
lot of significance to me.

How did you get involved in it?

I started taking piano lessons when I was around eight years old. My

parents decided to put me and my other siblings in piano lessons. There were
times when I didn’t want to take piano lessons anymore because I lost
interest or simply just didn’t want to practice anymore, but my parents
encouraged me to keep going. To this day I’m very grateful for my parents
keeping me in piano lessons even when I didn’t want to.

When did you become so interested?

I think that I was super interested in learning how to play piano when I
first started then about a couple years into it is when I started to lose
interest. I’m 17 now and it has probably just been in the last three or four
years that my interest in learning really returned. I got to the point where
I wasn’t just learning the basic techniques and I was able to play my choice
of music.

What made you want to start in the first place?

I always wanted to take piano lessons because my older siblings had taken
lessons. It was also lot because my parents wanted to be to.

Is it something that you share with people that are close to you?
I think that I have people close to me with whom I share the ability to play
the piano and that is really fun to be able to experience.

Have you met anyone through this hobby that has changed you or the way you look
at the activity?
My piano teacher has taught me a lot about music that I probably wouldn’t
have ever known otherwise and I am very grateful to her for that. I
definitely think I have developed a much greater appreciation for music by
learning how to play an instrument and studying the different aspects of
music.

Do you think that it has made you into who
you are today? How?
I think that everything in my past has contributed to making me who I am
today, so I definitely think that it has as well. It has taught me a lot
about patience and hard work. It also has given me something to have
confidence in and to feel proud of myself for. One of my favorite things is
having the ability to sit down and play whatever music I want. Playing the
piano seems to clear my mind and calm my spirit. It helps me release stress
that I may have experienced during the week and it is just overall very
soothing.

What have life lessons have you learned from this hobby?
As I said earlier, it has taught me a lot about patience. It has also taught
me that hard work and determination pay off in the end.

Does this hobby change the way you do other things in life?
I don’t think it necessarily changes the way I do things, but it helps me to
appreciate certain things more. It greatly increases my appreciation for
music and also for musicians.

If you could change anything about this hobby, what would it be?
I don’t think I would change anything. I only wish I had more time to play.

What could you do to get better?
A lot of practice. Piano playing is something you have to regularly practice
and keep up with in order to excel. It is also rather time consuming, but I
can guarantee you that it is worth it.

What does this hobby include to make you standout from every
other person?
I feel like it is my unique gift. Although many other people share the same
gift and talent, it still seems to be a strong part of me and a part of my
personality. The skill I have learned is such a blessing.

How long do you think you will continue on
with this?
My hope is that I will continue and keep up with it for the rest of my life.
I know it is easy to simply stop playing and eventually forget how, but I am
determined to stick with it. I love piano playing and I don’t ever want to
forget.

Is this something you will want to continue with your future family? Why or why not?
If I ever have kids someday, I would love to be able to teach them piano
lessons or enroll them in lessons. It has been such a blessing and gift in my
life and I would love if my kids could share in that same experience.

Arrests after bomb threats

Two teenagers were arrested this week after three suspicious packages were found in Princeton, Minn. Each of the packages contained a homemade bomb and was placed at three different locations in the city. It is not announced what led the authorities to these teens.

Star Tribune

Attempted robbery outside convenience store

A college student acts purely on instinct after being approached by a robber.

Sophomore journalism major, Michele Schipper, was approached at the convenience store on Bonneville Drive around 4:00pm yesterday.

As she was reaching into her car to grab her purse, she was approached by a man who was hidden behind a nearby dumpster when she parked, Schipper claims.

“I could see him approaching a little closer,” Schipper remembers. Without any major self-defense training Schipper turned on the six-foot-tall man and fought to keep her purse.

“I turned around and kicked him,” Schipper said. It was a kick that brought him down, “but I was afraid he wouldn’t stay down, that he would seek some kind of retribution.” So Schipper hit the man just one more time.

Once Schipper was sure that the robber was down she left the scene. “I got in my car, and I went away. I called the cops from a motel down the street.” But when the police arrived the man was gone. There were also no witnesses who could help describe the man to police.

Schipper was a little shaken up after the incident, “I was shaking for about an hour afterwards.”