“Excellent speaker! It all makes sense when put together like this.” This was a comment from one teacher attendee at the University of Maine Middle Level Institute in 1996 after hearing John...

While helping stimulate the economy one manicure-pedicure at a time, I was surprised at the salon cashier’s reaction to my response to the typical question, “What do you do?” The cashier,...

Can you imagine teaching middle grades students for more than four decades? As a middle school principal, I had the opportunity to work with just such a teacher. Barry Krizan taught three generations of our...

Whenever I tell people I'm a teacher, their response is respectful but often tempered with some comment that indicates that perhaps I was not intelligent enough to get a real job. When I add that I teach seventh...

Imagine, if you will. . . It is the first week of a new school year, and a group of about 50 middle school teachers is lingering around the library having coffee and catching up after summer vacation. The principal...

When I graduated from Slippery Rock University 25 years ago, I was eager to meet the challenges and enjoy the rewards I knew would come my way as an educator. I've not been disappointed. Over those two decades, I...