During lunch, Tana Ratnavale, middle school math teacher, meets with her students to help them one-on-one. She finds more pleasure in spending time helping her students outside of class, rather than being in division meetings. She’s going to miss these parts of teaching, as she is separating from Campbell Hall and her teaching journey.
Ratnavale, who students lovingly referred to as Mrs. Rat, has been at Campbell Hall for eight years teaching mainly algebra to middle schoolers. She starts every class with a question of the day, which she enjoys because it allows her to get to know her students. Furthermore Ratnavale wants to be remembered as a teacher who values her relationships with students. Her relationships with her students is something Ratnavale is going to miss deeply. She is taking a break from teaching, but plans to return to Campbell Hall in the future.
“Some of my fondest memories are being in the classroom teaching,” Ratnavale said. “I wish I could tell you it was at a field trip or a retreat. But honestly, when the math comes together for a kid and it’s seamless and you see a light in their eyes. That shows me I’m making a difference in someone’s life. Whatever I can do to help someone feel just confident and be able to tackle high school, I think that’s a big deal.”
Similar to Ratnavale, high school English teacher Dion Simmons enjoys teaching high school students because of the relationships he is able to build with his students. Simmons has been teaching tenth and eleventh grade English for 4 years at Campbell Hall. He has decided to leave Campbell Hall to go back to school for counseling. He enjoys when students come to him with questions or discussions unrelated to their class material. He feels going back to school will help him build those types of connections he enjoys most. Although he thinks of himself as an English teacher first, when students bring real life issues to him, it reminds him that education is just a part of our lives and we are humans at the core. These interactions are what he will miss most and hopes his students will remember about him after he separated from Campbell Hall.
“I hope that long after I leave this school, people are still calling Thursday, Friday-Eve because that’s how we should think about Thursdays, because we should be hopeful,” Simmons said. “On a more serious note, I hope that students can learn to balance thinking about themselves as scholars, who do work and turn in assignments and get grades, but also as learners and thinkers who are growing. The growth in learning isn’t always reflected in a grade and sometimes it is reflected in a negative grade. Some of the best lessons have been the grades that students were the least happy about. But that learning happens in the moment that learning is continuous and that you can’t actually grade learning.”
Meaningful learning can also come from real workplace experience. The new shadow program at Campbell Hall was created by alumni in order to allow students to experience what real jobs, in areas that interest them, are like. Alumni have also created many other resources for students to utilize and are creating a long-lasting impact on the school through their mentorship and networking. Aubrey Rakoski, the Associate Director of Advancement focusing on alumni relations, feels as though alumni and their legacies should be recognized more at Campbell Hall considering they do so much for the community. She believes that the opportunities offered by alumni are some of the most valuable at Campbell Hall. However, she hopes that in the future, alumni and students can get together more often and find ways to connect because at the moment they have very little interaction.
“The beautiful magic that I see every day is when an alum comes back to talk to a current student, even if it’s decades later that they’ve graduated, they both have this connection to Campbell Hall,” Rakoski siad. “I think it’s really nice for the students to see an alum in person but I feel like students don’t really know that they can talk to alumni. Alumni want more student partnership. I can tell you with sincere confidence, any time I ask an alum to talk to a student, the answer 100 percent of the time is yes.”
Dr. Chad LeCroix, high school chemistry teacher, finds inspiration from his mentor and previous colleague Ray Griffin. When LeCroix came to Campbell Hall ten years ago, Griffin helped him get to know the community and the science department. Since then, they have become close friends who often spend time together outside of school and even go on family vacations together. LeCroix attributes both his curriculum and personal teaching style to Griffin. Now that Griffin has retired, LeCroix continues to do loud and exciting labs in order to honor Griffin’s legacy and continue the traditions he created.
“He did so much behind the scenes to help the classes run smoothly,” LeCroix said. “I miss that a lot. He has inspired me to do the same for the new teachers. I watched him teach his [explosive] demonstrations and now I teach them as well. [I want to be remembered like he was], the crazy chemistry teacher that blows things up.”