Sarah G-H

Q: Where have you taught previous to CHS?

A: I started off teaching high school at St. Charles High School and I taught there for two years. And then I went to Rockwood Valley Middle School for two years. Then I was at Wydown for seven years and now I’m here. So, my first two jobs in St. Charles and in Rockwood I taught health and PE, Wydown it was just PE, and now here it’ll be health and PE.

Q: What prompted you to make the jump to CHS?

A: When the opportunity first came to me, I was like, “I don’t know, I need to think about that, I’m not sure if I really want to teach high school again”. I taught high school at the beginning of my career, but I was also really young. Right when you come out of college, even though you’re a first year teacher, you’re really not that ready to teach. So I think maybe that experience and perspective wasn’t that accurate to base everything off of. Then I went out of town for the national convention for health and PE, and so it just wasn’t the ideal time to balance thinking about that and the convention. But it ended up being the best thing ever because I was surrounded by all of my friends, who also teach PE, and they were all like, “you gotta do it”. So, I came back from the trip and decided I was totally in.

Q: What do you look forward to the most at CHS?

A: I’m really looking forward to teaching the freshman class because I just taught them when they were in eighth grade. Even though I know the sophomores and the juniors and the seniors, I have a particular connection to this class. It’s going to be awesome that on day one, even though we’re new to CHS, we’re not really new to the kids.

Q: Do you have a favorite moment from your teaching career?

A: My first year of teaching, I was teaching a weight lifting class to a class of all girls. I was new so they were totally testing me, didn’t fully trust me yet. And attached to the weight lifting room was an office which was no longer in use and the door knob to the office was broken but the phone still worked. I had to call the office for some reason. And everyone knew that if you were in that office, you couldn’t open the door from the inside. So I went in there to take a phone call and the door shut. A kid didn’t do it, it just shut. And so I was stuck in a closet during my first year of teaching and somehow convinced the girls to get me out. It was definitely a panic moment as a naive 22 year old.