Globe Newsmagazine, May 2021, Issue 8, Vol. 92

GL BE R E T IR IN G TE ACHERS . VOLUME 92 . ISSUE 8.

CLAYTON HIGH SCHOOL. CLAYTON, MO. MAY 2021.

THANK YOU TO OUR SPONSORS! The Globe is an entirely self-funded publication. We receive no funding from the school district for printing. Each issue of the Globe costs approximately $2000 to print.

We are deeply grateful to our sponsors for their support of our publication. They make our work possible. If you are interested in becoming a sponsor, please email us at globe@claytonschools.net.

issue sponsors ($2000 level) Gail Workman Clayton Education Foundation

pandemic patrons Mark and Krista Sucher Sultan Meghji Qinghong Wang Julie Taylor Matthew Bower Olivia Marcucci Anneliese Schaefer

Layla Guillen Tim Erlin Michael Reed

Erin Sucher-O’Grady James Zahniser Kimberly Carroll Peggy Guest

Laura Pierson David Lotsoff Jessica Millner

Siram Venugopalan Jannette Rusch

Patrick and Chris Win

Ann Zahniser Katie and Mark Sandquist

Raihana Omri

Elizabeth Cuneo Eudora Olsen Dave Zahniser Chris Meisl Ying Ma Mary Modzelewski

Matt Erlin Kathy and Jeff Wilkerson Radha Krishnaswamy Susana Erlin The Bruegenhemkes

Will Murphy Izzy Greenblatt Kelly Weygandt Marisa Johnson

Rachel Zahniser Aimee and Matt Snelling Linda Piecynski Phillip Lee The Naemi Family The Jerath Family Allison Creighton The Park Family Molina Dayal Janette Rusch Monica Mills David Zahniser Jim Zahniser Lan Yang Steven Bassnett Kiranmayi Mungara Nicole Svobodny David Stine Furniture

golden greyhound sponsors ($200+ level) St. Louis Suit Company Clayton All in Coalition Van’t Hof Family Cobblestone Quality Shoe Repair The Retina Institute Yeung Realtors

DTLS Landscape Architecture Dale Avenue Pediatrics Windsor Dave Stine Woodworking Alicia Espe

world traveler sponsors ($100+ level) The LaGesse Stanton Family Bob and Betsy Cuneo The Stemmler Family Ann Sachar The Chung Family Washington University Physicians Allergy & Immunology Clinics Mary and Dick Anthony

Robin and Neil Snelling Maya Jerath and Sanjoy Baruah Venkatesh Narayan Gita Krishnaswamy Christy Hager DDS Angela and Troy Quinn The Erlin Family The Family of Lary Baker

Kay Quinn Malone Andrew Nadin Christy Auston Marica and Josip Kos The Slen Family Carlie Chiou

12

24 retiring teachers COVER

FEATURE

new mayor elected: tishaura jones

By Alex Slen

FEATURE

14

teachers running

By Vivian Chen

Copy editor Vivian Chen documents how teachers have used running to stay connected during the pandemic.

44

REVIEW

moxie movie Christina Vodicka, Art teacher, sits in front of student projects

By Sasha Keller

LILY KLEINHENZ, PHOTOGRAPHER

CONTENTS 3

GL BE EDITORS-IN-CHIEF

STAFF

REPORTERS

Sofia Erlin and Shane LaGesse

Owen Auston-Babcock

Charlie Miller

CHIEF DIGITAL EDITOR

Stella Bishop

Kirby Miller

Jenna Bush

Isaac Millians

Rachel Chung

Ruby Nadin

Alexandra Cohen

Medha Narayan

Cecilia Dupor

Katherine Perrin

Isabel Erdmann

Abby Rosenfeld

Maya Goldwasser

Alex Slen

Isra Kayani

Samuel Smith

Tatum Ladner

Leo Taghert

Enoch Lai

Andrew Thompson

Chloe Lin

Sophia Thompson

SECTION EDITORS

Sophia Lu

Estella Windsor

Alex Hagemeister and Ruthie Pierson, NEWS

Ella McAuley

Annie Xiao

Emma Baum and Seraphina Corbo, FEATURE

Samantha McDonough

Siddhi Narayan

CHIEF MANAGING EDITOR Angela Xiao

SENIOR MANAGING EDITORS Ella Cuneo Lulu Hawley Noor Jerath Kaitlyn Tran Yiyun Xu

Ivy Reed and Disha Chatterjee, OPINION

ART EDITOR

Kaia MIlls-Lee and Cece Cohen, SPORTS

Sonali Dayal

Kate Freedman and Moriah Lotsoff, REVIEW Max Keller, PRO/CON

COPY EDITORS Vivian Chen and Margy Mooney

PAGE EDITORS

PHOTO EDITOR Eli Millner

PHOTOGRAPHERS Natalie Ashrafzadeh Cecilia Baer

Luka Bassnett

Ana Mitreva

Audrey Deutsch

Isabella Bamnolker

Sofia Mutis

Davia Goette

Chloe Creighton

Rachel Liang

Maci Klaus

Sahi Gokaraju

Naveed Naemi

Monica Klein

Thomas Gustafson

Neema Naemi

Avery Kleinhenz

Max Hagemeister

Emma Raine

Lily Kleinhenz

Sasha Keller

Sophie Srenco

Whitney Le

Daphne Kraushaar

Sophie Yoshino

Haley Lewis Amy Ma Sophie Matiszik Deborah Park Maya Richter Emma Stipanovich Kendall Turner Anna Walsh Esther Wang Angela Wirthlin

Professional Affiliations: Journalism STL, Missouri Interscholastic, Press Association, Missouri Journalism Education Association, Journalism Education Association, National Scholastic Press Association, Columbia Scholastic Press Association Please visit chsglobe.com for our editorial policy, mission statement, and ethics code. You can contact us at chsglobe@claytonschools.net with comments, story ideas or letters to the editor.

FROM THE E D I T O R S

I

n a few weeks, I will take my last ever steps in Clayton High School. I’ll park my car on the senior circle (one of the few senior traditions that has remained this year) and walk in through the front doors one last time. I’ll walk down the main stairs and look at the Commons. I’ll walk through the physics hallway and reminisce on my days as a freshman, frantically trying to finish up lab reports before class. I’ll walk into the Globe room and remember hours spent laughing, eating pizza, and finishing pages. I’ll peek into the library and think about all the secretly eaten lunches and homework I worked on in there. I’ll look at a clock, and every second I’ve spent wishing for class to end will come back to me. As I wander through CHS, every memory I’ve made will flicker through my mind again. Four years of hard work, growth, and chaos all done.

To be honest, my last day as a high school student probably won’t be so dramatic. I’ll come to school, go to my classes where we’ll celebrate by watching a movie or doing some other non-academic activity, then we’ll wait for the countdown. Finally, I’ll walk out the doors for the last time, take one final look, then walk to my car and drive home. That’s it.

When I think back on my high school experience, one of the only things that has remained constant is my time on Globe. Since I joined as a sophomore, my weeks have been framed in terms of deadlines, meetings, and interviews. Reporter’s meetings on Monday, editors’ dinner on Tuesday, rough drafts due next Friday, and so on.

Throughout the pandemic, even when everything else has been in flux, we’ve continued to put out an issue, month after month. It’s easy to get caught up in the stress of finishing by the deadline (like the one time all our pages got deleted and we had to recreate them in a day… thanks YearbookAvenue!) but now that I’ve *almost* made it out on the other side, I can’t help but feel thankful for all my time on staff. When you join the Globe, the first thing Mrs. Sucher-O’Grady says is that you get out of Globe what you’ve put in. I can now confidently say that if you attend weekly meetings, write stories every cycle, and pay your $15 for editors’ dinner pizza, you will come out with lifelong friendships, amazing experiences, and so much more.

As the school year winds to a close and we worry about the uncertainty of next year, just remember: the Globe will always be here.

F

reshman year. I walk into Clayton High School for the first time, in awe of its bustling population greeting each other after months apart. Everyone seems so grown up, so self-assured. I wonder when I’ll be like them.

Fast forward four years, and I’m about to leave Clayton for good, after experiencing the most absurd senior year ever. As I log in to Zoom meetings for various classes every day, I think about how close I am to the end of my high school experience. Soon, I will log off for the last time. Soon, I will attend my final Globe meeting. Soon, I will be done.

As I approach the end of this journey, I’ve been doing a lot of selfreflection of my past few years, and how the most important year-- my senior year-- has been so incredibly different. I remember sitting in class, a bottle of cold brew by my side, trying to inhale information after staying up to study for the latest test. I remember checking PowerSchools, frightened of my grade dropping after my latest essay.

I remember giggling with my friends after a teacher attempted to speak in slang. I remember being enthralled by a new piece of information, asking questions, learning. I remember editors’ dinners-coming together with a group of amazing people and working to create a magazine that is treasured by our community.

Although this year has been incredibly different, there are some constants that remain. There are still Globe meetings, even if I attend through a computer. There are still stories to be found, conversations to be had, connections to be made-- even if it’s not in person. This year has been extremely weird, extremely crazy and extremely different, but the Globe has been an ever-present source of familiarity, and a channel to have a sense of normalcy.

To new Globies, I hope your time in Globe is as amazing as mine was.

I hope you bond with all different types of people in staff meetings and editors’ dinners, hear stories from people from all walks of life, and find ways to look at things from all kinds of angles.

Globe has been a rock during a difficult time, and I am so sad to leave.

But, as I look into the future, I know the lessons I have learned will prop me up and remain with me forever.

siddhi narayan

sofia erlin

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

CHIEF DIGITAL EDITOR EDITOR’S LETTER 5

senior shirts The CHS senior class gathered in the quad in May to celebrate the annual college shirt day.

Photo by Marci Pieper

NEWS AND NOTES BIDEN ANNOUNCES AMERICAN FAMILY PLAN Joe Biden has released his $1.8 trillion American Family Plan. This plan tries to fundamentally change many aspects of American life, most notably through two free years of community college, universal preschool and increased taxes on individuals and corporations.

CRISIS IN INDIA India sees a COVID-19 surge in recent weeks. India has surpassed 400,000 new confirmed cases a day. This comes as thousands of people are dying as medical officials can not keep up with recent increase in infections. In recent days the death rate has grown to 120 people dying per hour. India’s recent growth can be attributed to recent religious festivals done with out many precautions as well as general skepticism of western medicine.

PFIZER VACCINE TO BE APPROVED FOR 12-15 YEAR OLDS The FDA is set to approve the PfizerBioNTech vaccine for 12-15 year olds later this week. This comes after the vaccine manufacturer has received emergency approval to vaccinate all people above the age of 16 in the United States. This would be the first COVID vaccine approved for this age group.

DEREK CHAUVIN GUILTY On April 20th, Derek Chauvin was found guilty of killing George Floyd.

This comes after a highly publicized trial. George Floyd’s death early last summer set off a wave of protests across the country. This verdict is seen as a win for supporters of the Black Lives Matter Movement.

HERD IMMUNITY UNLIKELY AS VACCINE RATE PLATEAUS According to a recent study done by The New York Times, herd immunity in the United States seems unlikely.

In recent days, vaccination rates have decreased as vaccine hesitancy has flourished. Herd immunity requires around 70-100 percent of the population to be fully vaccinated. In the United States, around 20 percent say they will not get a vaccine and another 15 percent say they are unsure. This number excludes children under the age of 12 who still cannot get vaccinated.

alex slen NEWS SECTION EDITOR NEWS 8

BLUE SKIES

The end of the school year brings a change in season. Warmer weather spurs flowers to bloom, birds to chirp, and people to go outdoors. This puzzle pays tribute to that hot time of relaxation and rejuvenation. 14 answers in this puzzle have an extra letter at the beginning or end that fits into one of the yellow triangles.

After the puzzle is solved, the letters in the triangles will reveal the theme when read clockwise.

(Answers on page 23.)

1.

4.

7.

9.

11.

12.

14.

15.

17.

19.

21.

23.

24.

25.

28.

30.

31.

32.

33.

34.

35.

36.

ACROSS Word on some Valentine’s Day candies (Interestingly, it is also the ticker symbol if you want to buy 33-Down for 33-Across) ___-caps (candy) or ___-cat (off-road vehicle) Soak completely Spanish bull Vocal artist Birds often found during the theme of this puzzle Eye related prefix Use your eyes Yellowstone grazer, maybe Gate fastener Palindromic woman’s name French “head” Prefix with dynamic or nautical Perfume ingredients ___-tv (Impractical Jokers channel) 12th graders: abbr.

Multiple Dog’s warning sound Air travel co. with a heart logo Where Dubai is, briefly “Give ___ whirl!”

Takes legal action

PUZZLE BY THOMAS GUSTAFSON

1 7

2

3

4

8

15

19

20

24

25

30

31

34

35

13 18

17 22

26

23 28

27 32 36

37 41

44

43 48

56

45 49

53

52

29

33

40

47

50 54

46 51

55

57 58

DOWN 1. Haul with effort 2. Purposes

16 21

39

37. Type of poodle or plaything 38. Fox News’ liberal counterpart 39. Symptom of dehydrated knees, fixable with some lotion 41. Mold 42. Soda containers 44. “On the ___” (running away) 45. There’s often a football field in the middle of one 47. Home of the ewoks 49. Chest muscle, for short 51. Aggravates 52. Flower that only lives for a year 54. Harsh irony, perhaps 56. Rice-shaped pasta 57. “Don’t ___ on me” (word on a flag with a rattlesnake) 58. Feature of an overlook 59. Great Lake

10

12

14

42

6

9

11

38

5

59

3. Runny egg order 4. Orchestra sect.

5. Easy fortnite elimination, perhaps 6. The moon and space station, for two 7. “Same here!”

8. Brittle bond type for a salt 10. Sleep disturbers 11. Opposite of dense 13. Borat’s learned retort 14. Patience, or permissible mechanical variation 16. First lady, or palindromic woman’s name 18. Television associations 20. Toffee bar brand 22. Premium beef cattle 26. Common shelled land mollusk in your garden 27. Wave peak 29. What one of the spikes around this puzzle

30.

31.

33.

36.

39.

40.

41.

43.

46.

48.

50.

53.

55.

represents. The letters in the spikes form the theme of this puzzle when read clockwise.

What this puzzle is supposed to look like, or a central feature of the weather during the theme of this puzzle The state you are most likely in if you are reading this Company shares Half of a school year “All bark ___ bite” Snooze SI unit of capacitance Name for a raggedy doll Costa ___ Demolish Baker v. Carr (landmark Supreme Court Case) Like bass notes Camping gear store PUZZLES 9

INKBLOT NARRATIVES: A BIT OF HOLLYWOOD IN STL The Globe dives in to a local film production company started by Aaron Bowden and CHS alum Erik Becker.

Ryan Doris (left) and Erik Becker (right) film for their documentary.

A

PHOTO PROVIDED BY INKBLOT NARRATIVES

aron Bowden and Erik Becker were driving around, searching for office space when their phone rang. It was their agent calling to inform them that they loved their sizzle reel for what would become the Discovery documentary “Who Killed the Lyon Sisters?”

Bowden grew up in Philadelphia and attended Florida State University, graduating in 1999.

He then became a staff writer for the Concord Monitor, a daily newspaper in New Hampshire, for two years. After realizing he wanted to pursue television, he moved to St. Louis for a short period of time, where he began working at Coolfire Studios and met his wife. Together, they then moved to Los Angeles, where he would work at Wild Eyes Productions until returning back to St. Louis to work for Coolfire Studios once again.

Becker, raised in STL, attended Clayton High School from 1997-2001. He then attended

FEATURE 10

Columbia College in Chicago for film and music production. Becker worked at Apple for about three years, gaining more experience in technology before moving to other production companies, editing videos.

Becker and Bowden met in 2011 when Becker was hired as a freelance editor by Coolfire Studios (another locally owned production studio) to work on MFF: Mom Friends Forever, a reality tv show on Nickmom where Bowden worked as the Co-Executive Producer.

“Erik was by far the best editor that they brought in. That was immediately apparent by the first cut he ever showed me. And then we started working together really closely,” Bowden said. “Every project that we got, after that, I just insisted that we have to have him because we’re not going to be able to do it [without him].”

In April 2018, Bowden and Becker formed their own fully operational television production company: Inkblot Narratives.

They left their previous job together in order to create the type of media they wanted to produce and to further their careers.

“When you’re working for another production company, or you’re a freelancer, you are kind of just a hired gun on whatever you are put on,” said Becker. “We wanted to be able to pitch our own projects. We’re open to lots of different things, but I think we are mostly focused on telling true stories and documentaries.”

So, that is exactly what they did.

On March 25, 1975, sisters Katherine and Sheila Lyon disappeared during a trip to their shopping mall in Wheaton, Maryland. There were no leads on the case for years until 2013, when the Montgomery County, Maryland police made a break in the case.

Mark Bowden, journalist, author, and father to Aaron Bowden, had been assigned to cover the missing girls when he was 23 and working at Baltimore News American, a now discontinued newspaper. Since 1975, Mark Bowden grew as a journalist and continued growing his family. In 2014, he came across a newspaper article announcing that the police were proclaiming a new person of interest in the 40-year-old Lyon sisters case.

“He heads down to Maryland right away.

He was working on a totally different book at the time, but this particular story meant a lot to him,” said Aaron Bowden, talking about his father. “It was the rarest story he ever worked on. Sad. Dark. [It was] a story that had no resolution whatsoever. These girls just disappear basically off the face of the map, there were no answers for anyone ever. So, he was haunted by that for a long time and really motivated to dig back into it and see what happened there. How did they, the police, all the sudden have a new person of interest?”

When Mark Bowden finally got to Maryland and met with the police, they gave him a hard drive filled with everything. It contained 30 years worth of evidence, all of the wiretaps and interrogations, videos of the interviews, every piece of evidence one could imagine.

“So he decides he is going to write a book.

Then he showed Aaron the hard drive, and we were talking about it and decided, ‘Wow, this is pretty right for a documentary because of all of this visual material that we have.’ And it is a fascinating story. And it is some really impressive detective work, and we had all this content,” said Becker, realizing how everything added up.

Evidence from the Lyon sisters case laid out on a table to be used for filming.

PHOTO PROVIDED BY INKBLOT NARRATIVES

Becker and Bowden, taking the role as the executive producers, editor and director, began working on their documentary “Who Killed the Lyon Sisters?” in April of 2018. With the freedom of their own company, they hired many STL-based people, including Clayton High School graduates Lauren Bernstein (the post-production supervisor) and Alicia Vega (a producer). Their director of photography, Ryan Doris, was also St. Louis-based, as well as Scott Adderton, another editor. They also have a full-time assistant editor, Kara Paar, who was raised and lives in STL. With most of their film provided through the information on the hard drive, they needed to recreate some of the other cinematography, most of which was shot in St. Louis during the pandemic.

As they continued to work, they soon realized that the story was much bigger than they thought. After being abducted from the mall, the Lyon sisters ended up on a mountain in Thaxton, Virginia where police later discovered a disturbing family dynamic.

“The most shocking part of the story is that it involves a family. The suspect that pleaded guilty comes from a family for whom incest was common, as well as sexual abuse of all kinds.

In the process of making it, it was shocking to interview some members of that family and hear how matter-of-a-factly they would describe these kinds of things,” said Bowden.

As they continued their process, they met with family members, some who had left the mountain and some who hadn’t. They learned of a cousin of the main suspect who was not involved in the original crime but had memories of what her family was like back then. Bowden and Becker wanted to gain her trust and her interview, and knowing whatever she would say would only further the complexity of the Lyon sisters’ case and their understanding of the family.

“The first time I spoke to her on the phone, it was sort of belligerent. I wasn’t sure this was going to go anywhere,” said Bowden. “She asked that we pick her up at a Panera Bread.”

They eventually picked her up at a St. Louis

Bread Company and ended up interviewing her in a park at a picnic bench with barren woods behind her, adding to the feel of her story.

“There’s a lot of serendipity, especially with non-fiction storytelling, where you just kind of get lucky sometimes,” said Bowden.

Bowden and Becker decided they wanted to see the infamous house on the mountain in Virginia, but they were warned by the local police that they should not go up there by themselves. “[The local police] even told the Montgomery Police Department from Maryland not to go up

to the mountain without them,” said Becker.

“That explains the culture of that area, they do not care if you are a cop. If you come up on their mountain, there are no rules.”

So, how did the sisters get on the mountain?

How many people were involved? Why does the same family keep popping up in the investigation? Why won’t the police go up on the mountain? Becker and Bowden address all of these questions in their documentary, “Who Killed the Lyon Sisters?” available to watch now on Investigation Discovery, Discovery+, iTunes and Amazon Prime Video.

Aaron Bowden (left) and Erik Becker (right) look at screens during filming.

PHOTO PROVIDED BY INKBLOT NARRATIVES

ella cuneo

SENIOR MANAGING EDITOR FEATURE 11

NEW MAYOR IN TOWN Tishaura Jones, an African American woman and single mother is elected Mayor of St. Louis.

Mayor Tishaura Jones stands with her son Aden answering questions for a TV interview

O

n November 4th, 2020, the day after election day, St. Louis City would begin to change. Tishaura Jones, the treasurer of the city, would announce her candidacy to run for mayor of St. Louis.

Jones is different from most other mayors in St. Louis. She is African American, a woman and a single mom, a combination not often seen in politics. She set out to change the city to make it more equitable for everyone.

The City of St. Louis has more issues than most metropolitan areas. Over the past 50 years, the city has seen massive population decline as well as a rise in poverty and crime.

Today, St. Louis holds the grim honor of being the most dangerous city in America by murders per capita. The city is also poor with around a quarter of all residents under the poverty line. The City of St. Louis, despite being equal parts Black and white, has never had a Black female mayor; until recently there had never been a female mayor of St. Louis. For all of these reasons, Jones’ run would have seemed improbable just a few years ago.

In her new role, Mayor Jones has decided to focus on two main issues: representation and

FEATURE 12

“

THE FACT THAT TISHAURA SPOKE ABOUT FOCUSING ON MAKING SURE THAT NORTH ST. LOUIS WOULD RECEIVE ATTENTION AS A BLACK WOMAN WHO LIVES IN THAT NEIGHBORHOOD, WHO HAS FAMILY WHO LIVES FURTHER NORTH OF THAT, SHE UNDERSTANDS THE IMPORTANCE OF THAT AND IS NOT AFRAID OF IT.

LAURIE SKRIVAN, PHOTOGRAPHER criminal justice, a sentiment clearly seen in her announcement to run for mayor.

She announced her run from a park in North St. Louis, a location that speaks volumes.

Vincent Flewellen, the Chief Diversity Officer at Webster University and Clayton High School alum, noted the symbolic nature of the announcement.

“I’m almost positive that there have been no other mayoral candidates that have gone north of Delmar to announce anything other than maybe a crime bill, or a cleanup plan, right? But she talked about being from North St. Louis, you’ve talked about being from that area, that was her neighborhood, that is our neighborhood.”

Flewellen also noted how Jones’ experience as a single mother from North St. Louis resonated with voters.

“The fact that Tishaura spoke about focusing on making sure that North St. Louis would receive attention as a Black woman who lives in that neighborhood, who has family who lives further north of that, she understands the importance of that and is not afraid of it,” he said.

Jones plans to equitably distribute the half a billion dollars of federal aid money that is supposed to come to St. Louis. She is creating a committee that resembles the population of St. Louis to try to figure out how this money can help the community at large.

Jones also plans on changing up St. Louis criminal justice policy; one of her most notable proposals was closing the infamous prison in St. Louis known as The Workhouse.

Matt Rauschenbach, campaign spokesperson for the Mayor, noted the significance of reform in St. Louis correctional institutions.

“There is a need to invest in making the necessary repairs to our correctional facilities and finally closing The Workhouse,” he explained.

This promise did not go unanswered. In her latest budget proposal to the Board of Aldermen, the mayor’s office planned to remove all funding for The Workhouse. This comes at an awkward time, as the main prison recently faced an uprising. Not too long ago, the Mayor and freshman Congresswoman Cory Bush toured the main jail. There, Jones

reiterated her goal to revisit criminal justice reform in the city. Fixing the city prison system hit another snag.

Part of the proposal for closing the Workhouse was to send the inmates to county jails, but the county recently said that they did not have any extra room to take in city detainees. Nick Dunne, the public information officer for the Mayor’s office, said that the city is looking for alternatives locations to host detainees in proper living conditions within a 50-mile radius.

St. Louis also has some of the highest crime rates in the country; as such, it became a key campaign issue for Jones.

She believes, “If you’re picking up a paycheck, you’re much less likely to be picking up a gun.”

This philosophy is a guiding principle for the new administration as it seeks to level out record crime rates and decarcerate individuals from prison. Jones is also planning to improve community-police relationships in the city.

One way she plans on doing this is by changing the way 911 calls are handled. They call these triaging 911 calls. They describe it as, “if you’re

in a mental health crisis, you get sent to a mental health counselor and not necessarily an armed officer.” They have already started to implement this policy, but the effectiveness is still unknown. The idea of this came from a study conducted in North St. Louis, where they claim that 50 percent of 911 calls did not require an armed officer. This new plan could help to decrease problematic encounters between community members and police officials.

Jones represents a new era in St. Louis leadership as the city’s first female AfricanAmerican woman with her plans to change the way the city operates from the ground up. Tishaura Jones is trying to bring change to a city on the verge of many catastrophes at once. From crime rates, decreasing population, COVID-19, police brutality and racism, St. Louis sits at the edge of the knife.

The question remains, will Tishaura Jones be able to bring the needed change to her city?

alex slen

NEWS SECTION EDITOR

If you are the kind of person who wants to make a difference, this opportunity is for you!

Promote health and well-being

Increase awareness around issues related to teen substance use and mental health

All In Clayton Coalition is looking for student representatives for next year! You have a voice; we'd love to hear it!

Give back to your community

"I always feel like I can be myself and say my thoughts and no one can judge me. The coalition is really a great place to share thoughts and ideas and make the world a better place".

— A current student representative

For more info, email All In Coordinator, Mrs. Sherony, at kimberlysherony@claytonschools.net

FEATURE 13

TEACHERS RUNNING Since the pandemic, a group of Clayton teachers have turned to running as a way to connect

RAYCHELLE MARTIN

From left to right: Clayton teachers Dave Powers, Kurt Kleinberg and Paul Hoelscher ran a half-marathon on Saturday, April 10th.

PHOTO FROM PAUL HOELSCHER

Y

esterday, I had changed and was getting ready to go for a run. I came into the math office wearing gym shorts and a shirt. And as soon as I stepped in, Mr. Kleinberg goes, ‘Oh, I thought you got your P.E. credit over the summer’,” said CHS teacher Kyle McCord. “Today, he was reflecting on that, like ‘I can’t remember ever getting roasted that bad.’ And then [someone said to him], ‘Kleinberg, [did you get your clothes] from the boys department?”

Whether it’d be bowling tournaments between the math and science departments or faculty parties outside of school, the CHS staff has always found ways to socialize.

Luckily, the pandemic hasn’t changed that.

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“[Each year], [Dr.] Hoelscher organizes a golf tournament in the summer. And last year, we did a COVID friendly golf tournament [where] there were multiple events, and Mr. Kohmetscher and I won the partners version,” said McCord. “So now I have this big trophy on my mantle that my wife hates, and the fact that she hates it makes it even better.”

In addition to modifying their current activities and traditions, some Clayton faculty members have turned to running as a way to hang out and get together. Teachers Paul Hoelscher and Kurt Kleinberg have been running on and off for the last five to six years, participating in multiple half-marathons and other smaller runs.

“I have a story of a race from 2016 [that] Dr. Hoelscher and I did. We were both talking as we were running, and the race was going great.

Neither of us saw a lip on the curb, and we just ate the sidewalk. We got up and kept running,” said Kleinberg. “I still have the gloves with the gigantic hole in them. Looking back, it didn’t feel good. But it was funny.”

Since the pandemic began, the two of them have been using the extra time to start consistently training for larger events.

“Through COVID, [running has] been my chance to get outside and do things. For me, it’s been really healthy to get sunshine, to get exercise, and to have a routine,” said Hoelscher.

“I’m a very goal oriented person. If I just said I was going to run and I didn’t have a training schedule and a goal, I wouldn’t do it as much and I wouldn’t do it as consistently.”

“I’ve been playing soccer off and on, I’ve been doing things off and on, but I had really gotten out of a groove. Dr. Hoelscher was really the impetus, he’s really a good motivator. He’s the one that wanted to start running again,” said Kleinberg. “[He] saw the advertisement for the KT82, and he [thought] that sounded really fun. And so we had some other friends who are way better runners than we are, and so [it was a good opportunity for us to] keep running, stay in shape, and do something outside that’s social and safe.”

The KT82 race consists of eighteen legs of different lengths. On a typical six-person team, each individual would run three of the eighteen legs. The total distance ran would add up to 82 miles.

“The part that I’m trying to organize right now is spacing out who’s going to run which legs. Everyone runs three legs, but everyone on the team has different levels of experience,” said Hoelscher.

“Dr. Hoelscher is really excited about it. He has spreadsheets, he’s looking at like who could run where, that kind of stuff,” said Kleinberg.

So far, the team consists of Hoelscher, Kleinberg, McCord, Glenridge 3rd Grade teacher Gregg Thompson, Wydown history teacher Dave Powers and CHS math teacher Katelyn Long.

“I’m going out to Colorado Springs to hang out with one of my best friends. And I wanted to do some outdoor activities with him. He’s a big mountain biker. He’s in really good shape.

So my New Year’s resolution was that I needed to hike every weekend. I wanted attainable exercise and goals,” said McCord.

In addition to getting more in shape, running has also served as a great way for the teachers to hang out with each other.

“There was one day where I was training on my own, and then I ran into Dr. Hoelscher and Mr. Powers [running in] Forest Park, so then we just all ran together,” said Kleinberg.

“

WE ALL LIKE TO JOKE AROUND AND HAVE FUN, BUT WE’RE ALSO SUPPORTIVE OF EACH OTHER. “I have a lot of friends I haven’t been able to see because they haven’t necessarily made the right decisions. And with my wife’s health, we can’t take any risks. But I’m seeing Kleinberg and my coworkers every day, so I’m already exposed to them. By hanging out with them, it didn’t open up any new exposure,” said McCord.

“We all like to joke and have fun, but we’re also supportive of each other,” said Kleinberg.

“There was a time when Dr. Hoelscher was planning an impromptu trail run, where we were all taking legs. The point was to end up at this restaurant. And then we got there, the restaurant wasn’t even open. So we had run all this way, and then we had no place to get food, so we had to drive all the way back, since we were in the middle of nowhere. It’s kind of a running joke with Dr. Hoelscher… It’s [happened] a couple of times. We did a practice run at Creve Coeur Lake, and we were going to end up at the restaurant there, and it was closed again.”

“In my defense, the cafe is always open, and it even has a sign that says ‘Open 365 Days’. I don’t know why it was closed, but it wasn’t like we couldn’t get in our cars and drive to another place,” said Hoelscher. “I didn’t abandon us.

None of the other runners do much planning, so I’d like it to be recorded that I’m the adult in the group.”

Ultimately, running and other social activities give the Clayton faculty more time to spend with the teachers leaving the school district.

“I’ve been trying to pick the brains of people retiring and try to learn what I can from them.

We’ve talked about other people stepping up and filling roles, but we’re never going to be able to fill everything,” said McCord. “I think we’ve talked a lot about leadership roles in the department changing. Up to this point, I wouldn’t necessarily say I’m a leader in the department. Now, I feel like I need to step up and I feel like I’ve been asked, ‘Okay, we’re going to need you to lead in this way.’”

“I am certain we will get text messages and pictures of things [from them]... I could totally see Mr. Moody in the middle of the day sending something like, ‘Hey, we’re out to lunch at this place, taking pictures of food. How’s it going at work?’” said McCord. “The math department is very tight knit and that’s not going to change.

The people that retired, they’re not really going away. They’re just not working.”

As part of his training, Clayton teacher Kyle McCord (right) hiked to the top of Mt. Hermann in Colorado Springs.

PHOTO FROM KYLE MCCORD

Clayton teacher Kurt Kleinberg running in the Capital City Biathlon

PHOTO FROM KURT KLEINBERG

vivian chen

COPY EDITOR

FEATURE 15

HIGH-SPEED PLANS The Biden administration, high-speed rail and what it means Conceptual rendering of the California High-Speed Rail project.

CALIFORNIA HIGH-SPEED RAIL AUTHORITY, PHOTOGRAPHER

H

igh speed railroads are a faster, more environmentally-friendly, and cheaper form of transportation than cars or railroads as they currently exist. So why doesn’t America have any? Pete Buttigieg, the Secretary of Transportation under President Biden, wants to add this method of transportation to everyday Americans’ lives.

High speed rail is a proven technology that is in place across Europe, Japan, and China. The rail itself uses continuous welding in order to achieve high speeds. The technology used for each system may vary, but what’s the same is the speed. In order to be classified as a high speed rail, it has to be able to reach a speed of 120 mph.

On an April 9th press conference, Buttigieg said, “Americans are spending too much of their money on transportation in the wrong ways, or don’t have access to it at all.” Biden also made clear his intentions of incorporating high speed rail into America when he said,

FEATURE 16

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AMERICANS ARE SPENDING TOO MUCH OF THEIR MONEY ON TRANSPORTATION IN THE WRONG WAYS, OR DON’T HAVE ACCESS TO IT AT ALL.

“My administration will spark the next great railroad revolution.”

Imagine the ability to travel from San Francisco to Los Angeles by train in three hours. Currently, it takes twelve hours to take this trip by train, common for both tourists and businesspeople. California is currently the only state in the US that plans to build high speed rail. At first, California’s rail would travel from Los Angeles to San Francisco and from Los Angeles to Sacramento with stops in other cities along the way. This plan was incredibly ambitious. Currently a line from Merced to Bakersfield is under construction. This project could be a sign of what’s to come if the federal government decides to build high speed rail: an expensive and time-consuming project.

The federal government has yet to create a plan for a United States high speed railroad. A popular image, titled “United State High Speed Rail System”, suggests a network that travels from Los Angeles to New York, Los Angeles

to Miami, as well as rails going up the East and West coasts. Overall, the image suggests a network that would connect most of the United States. Secretary Buttigieg retweeted this image with the caption “Gen Z is dreaming big. It’s time we all did the same.”

The interstate nature of this project makes it difficult for anything to get done. Republicanrun states have in the past denied high speed rails going through their state and may do so again. Then-President Barack Obama had intentions to build a high speed rail network but they fell short after some red and purple states refused to build high speed rail.

In 1959, the United States had the fastest railroads. But now, 18 other nations have managed to beat the United States in high speed railways. Japan is known for having the first bullet trains. One can find successful highspeed rail across Europe; China has also developed this mode of transportation.

The fact that many countries have already had high-speed trains leads some to be critical to whether America in the 21st century is the correct time and place to “spark the next great train revolution”. The Cato Institute writes on Twitter, “Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg wants to make the United States the ‘global leader’ in high‐​speed rail. That’s like wanting to be the world leader in electric typewriters, rotary telephones, or steam

locomotives.”

High speed rail is incredibly fast. Faster than cars and more convenient than a domestic flight, it is an easier form of travel than any existing option in America. Japanese bullet trains can travel a maximum speed of 200 miles per hour. The Acela Express, a railway running between Boston and Washington DC, travels a maximum of 150 miles per hour but on average will only travel 66 miles per hour. And that railway is the fastest in the United States.

Along with being faster than cars, it is also more energy efficient. It uses one-fifth the

amount of energy compared to cars. In China, more people ride on high speed trains than travel on domestic flights, meaning that the amount of air travel has gone down. This also has a positive impact on the environment, as high speed rail uses one-third of the energy of planes. It is estimated by Elizabeth Deakin at the University of California, Berkeley that the

California high speed rail network will reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 12 billion pounds every year.

Countries like China argue that the development and use of high speed railways benefits the economy. In California, the program has created more than 5,500 construction jobs and is predicted to create even more permanent jobs. Critics argue that the United States’ economy would not benefit from high speed railways. Compared to Japan and the European nations where high speed rail has been a success, the United States has a lower population density, meaning less people will be commuting using the high speed rail. Jeff Davis at the Eno Center for Transportation says, “For fixed-guideway mass transportation… there’s just no substitute for population density as a measure of the need for, and likely success of, the system.”

“Amtrak Joe”, as President Biden has been called, is going to attempt what former President Obama attempted.

And if he wants to build high speed rail, he has to hurry before 2022, when Republicans might take back the House or Senate. If the Biden administration manages to make a United States high speed rail network, the way we look at travel will be changed.

cecilia dupor REPORTER

HIGH-SPEED TRAINS AROUND THE WORLD

mi/hr Operating Speed Fuxing (China)

220

Shinkansen (Japan) Acela (U.S.)

Maximum Speed

200 84

260 250

150 FEATURE 17

SEWING TO SAVE LIVES Sophomore Lily Kleinhenz made and donated masks during the national shortage to help keep her community safe.

D

uring the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, the US experienced a mass mask shortage that put essential workers and thousands of other Americans at a higher risk of catching the deadly disease. During this time of need, sophomore Lily Kleinhenz supported her community by sewing and donating thousands of masks to those in need.

“My mom introduced me to a Facebook group called Fabric Face Masks for St Louis,” explained Kleinhenz. “In that group, nurses, doctors, hospitals, anyone, could send in requests for face masks. I would visit the site every single day and see who needed masks and try to complete their requests.”

Kleinhenz worked with Clayton businesses such as Pickleman’s and various local rehabilitation centers, nursing homes and hospitals. She would also have many people personally reach out to her for masks.

“When we had individual orders from doctors and nurses and such, they would come to my house to pick up their order and we had a bin set out in the front so they could drive up and get them.”

Though what Kleinhenz was doing was amazing, it was also expensive;w considering how she made hundreds of masks a week, the cost for fabric, elastic and other essential materials was no small bill.

“At the beginning my mom paid for a lot of it, we would get the fabric from local craft stores, but we reached a point where we couldn’t find any since they had been backordered. We were able to find some of our materials on online sites for a while but even those started to run out,” Kleinhenz said. “So I ended up putting a post out on the Nextdoor app basically saying that I was making face masks and if anyone had any spare fabric I would really appreciate the donation.”

The post ended up being a big success, tons of Kleinhenz’s neighbors reached out offering scrap fabric, cotton sheets and other materials she was in need of.

The response was so massive that it came to a point where Kleinhenz had to make a follow up post saying she would no longer be accepting donations.

“My mom and I would sit in my room for hours every day and night sewing and sewing

Lily Kleinhenz poses with one of her masks

Photo provided by Lily Kleinhenz and sewing,” Kleinhenz said. “Some of the orders we did were over a hundred masks and we would personally deliver them to the hospitals and different places. Once we even had someone message us from Seattle asking for masks and we ended up shipping tons out to them.”

Kleinhenz realizes that there were many people who helped her in this journey and made it possible for her to be able to do all this.

“Inna Park was our group organizer and she’s actually a CHS parent, but she’s the one who would spend hours and hours making these Google Sheets where we could get all of the information we needed. She was really the one who kept us all in line.”

Beyond just local social media ads, Kleinenz says that the Facebook group was really able to spread its message far thanks to the help of their community, “Mrs. Park had reached out to Fox Two when we were low on supplies and Jasmin Hutta did a story on our group, and so

when it was broadcast we were able to get a lot of donations from all the people who saw it.”

For Kleinhenz, the hours of sewing and delivering masks was all worth it in the end,“When nurses and doctors would come to pick up masks from my house, I would speak to them and it was really nice knowing where my masks were going and seeing who I’m going to be helping.”

Kleinhenz kept up her donations until masks became more widely available. Her efforts were repaid with all the appreciation she was shown.

Through her efforts, we can see how anyone can support and bring together their community while in difficult times.

isra kayani REPORTER

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When nurses and doctors would come to pick up masks from my house, I was able to speak to them and it was really nice knowing where my masks were going.

FEATURE 19

SENDING T The Globe’s seniors take a look back at their time on The Globe and their favorite memories.

Eli Millner | Photo Editor University of Colorado Boulder | Communications “Working with and getting to know the awesome people on The Globe staff”

Ruthie Pierson | Section Editor University of Missouri | Business “I’ve made a lot of new friends and gotten so many opportunities from being on Globe”

Annie Xiao | Reporter Washington University in STL | Undecided “I loved the community and the staff’s willingness for big conversations” Angela Xiao | Chief Managing Editor Washington University in STL | Psychology “Designing the cover after every deadline and getting the opportunity to collaborate with the most amazing people” FEATURE 20

Max Keller | Section Editor Carleton College | Computer Science “Going to editors’ dinners”

THEM OFF Sofia Erlin | Co-Editor In Chief University of Chicago | Undecided “Getting to bond with other editors during meetings and editors’ dinners, especially during the pandemic”

Luka Bassnett | Page Editor Oxford University | Philosophy, Politics, & Economics “Writing the Gloob”

Rachel Liang | Page Editor Tufts University | Biology and Graphic Arts “Trying amazing restaurants around STL for Globe reviews as well as educating myself on important topics through interviews!”

Noor Jerath | Senior Managing Editor Wesleyan University | Undecided “I moved to Missouri as a freshman and being on Globe was a great way to get to know the St. Louis area and the Clayton community”

Neema Naemi | Page Editor DePaul University | Film and Journalism “We have snacks and pizza in the globe room- Erin Sucher O’Grady”

Disha Chatterjee | Section Editor Washington University in STL | Undecided “The fun bonding activities and the experience of in-field journalism”

Cece Cohen | Section Editor Washington University in STL | Math “Writing stories with Kaia” Siddhi Narayan | Chief Digital Editor Rice University | Mathematical Economics “Getting to meet so many amazing people and build memories together!”

FEATURE 21

VACCINES HIT CHS

Students and teachers at CHS are receiving the Pfizer vaccine for protection against COVID-19.

Students and teachers at CHS had a granted opportunity to receive their first doses of the Pfizer vaccine against COVID-19 in the Stuber Gymnasium.

E

ver since the pandemic began back in March 2020, science was the school subject that made us want to tune in to different news channels to see the rapid history of COVID-19 since the start of lockdown.

Many drugs and vaccines have been tested in different laboratories along the way with blunt results, dull as a pencil. In the end of 2020, the Pfizer vaccine was 95% effective and started being distributed to different adults, along with other vaccines that came later, such as Moderna and J&J. Teachers started getting their doses at the beginning of March, but it was the week of April 12 that sixteen-year-olds became part of the science of these vaccines, which drove our school district to think about how to start next year.

On April 21, 2021, students at CHS who were at least 16 years of age as well as other teachers, received their first doses of the Pfizer vaccine live in Stuber Gym. According to our district’s Instagram page, the number of students who got their first dose of the Pfizer vaccine between 11am and 3pm was over 600, roughly two-thirds of the 877 high school students at Clayton.

Ruby Nadin, who is at the bottom of the age limit as of right now for getting these vaccines, and English teacher Dana Augustine, received their first dose of the Pfizer vaccine at CHS the same day.

There were a lot of feelings as the date came up.

FEATURE 22

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LILY KLEINHENZ, PHOTOGRAPHER

“I was really excited because I really wanted to get vaccinated,” said Nadin. “I’d be able to do more and go to England to visit family.”

Even young people and teens were looking forward to doing what they have missed out on for over a year, when COVID-19 started spreading in the United States in mid-March of 2020 and international travel was restricted and deferred by the CDC in February that year.

For Augustine, since she is a teacher who has been eligible since the end of February, the clinic provided easy access to vaccination.

“The clinic was convenient because I was already at work,” Augustine explained. “So I could just walk down the hall to get my vaccine.”

After the vaccine, some recipients felt mild symptoms.

“Before the shot, I felt pretty good, I was pretty confident about it. I was a bit nervous,” Nadin described. “I haven’t gotten sick yet but I’m waiting for the second shot, so we’ll see.”

The appointments we made for Wednesday’s trials will not change, and the same people will get their second dose of the vaccine on May 12, an interval of three weeks.

Augustine described her reactions and nerves to the vaccine like a process.

“Before, I was slightly nervous. Everyone working at the event was nice and helpful so that made me feel more relaxed,” said Augustine. “After the shot, I was surprised at

how quickly it was over. I felt mostly fine; for 24-36 hours after the shot, I felt really tired and thirsty.”

The vaccine clinic is also a major sign of what to expect next year. Back in March of this year, the School District of Clayton expected for everyone of all ages to be immunized from many other common diseases such as hepatitis B, measles, meningococcal, varicella, and many more on their ‘Featured News’ at claytonschools.net.

However, this virus came later in this scenario when older teens under 18 became eligible for immunization from the pandemic.

“I definitely expect the majority would’ve been vaccinated by next year. I assume Clayton will make it mandated to get vaccinated,” Nadin said. “If you want to come back full time with no masks, I would expect them to make it more of a requirement.”

However, the state of Missouri is not requiring COVID-19 vaccination to attend school, so it is unlikely that Clayton will require a mandate.

Augustine is focused on finishing out this school year and enjoying summer break.

“I honestly am not thinking about the 202122 school year at all,” she said. “We still have the rest of the year to get through and a summer vacation to enjoy.”

kirby miller

REPORTER

ww

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(To puzzle on page 9) BLUE SKIES “Summer Vacation”

O I L U V S NO N DOU S E TOR O T S I NG E R R OB I N S S E E B I S ON OP T I L A T CH A V A T E TE A E R O E S S E NC E S T R U S R S MA N Y G R R S WA UAE I TA S UES TOY C NN A S H I N E S S F OR M C A N S L AM T R A C K E ND O R P E C I R K S A NNU A L S A R C A S M OR ZO TRE AD V I EW E R I E R

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RETIRING TEACHERS

By Seraphina Corbo, Owen Auston-Babcock, Shane LaGesse, Alexandra Hagameister, Ivy Reed, Annie Xiao, Sonali Dayal, Charlie Miller and Sophie Yoshino

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sean

doherty

“I never came into this district thinking I was going to end up being the superintendent,” said Dr. Sean Doherty, the Superintendent of the School District of Clayton, who announced his plan to retire at the end of the 2020-21 school year in September 2020. Doherty has served as superintendent for the last five years, one of which as the interim superintendent while simultaneously serving as assistant superintendent of human resources.

Throughout his time at Clayton, he has emphasized the importance of his role as the lead learner, a term he capitalized on through his monthly letters From the Lead Learner.

“In order to be the best leader, you have to come to the table as a learner and you have to be willing to have your mindset changed,” said Doherty. “You have to be willing to be vulnerable. I think being a learner means that there’s a certain level of vulnerability; you don’t know everything.”

A mantra of his career has been the role of a learner. In his February 2021 letter, he says that the term learner refers to any stakeholder in the District.

“In our strategic plan, we use the word ‘learner’ instead of ‘student’ because the expectation is everyone has the opportunity to grow,” said Doherty in an interview.

The mentality of growth and vulnerability has been a constant throughout his service as superintendent; a mindset which he believes sets the tone for the District. Having been initially put in the role of interim superintendent following the previous superintendent’s sudden incapacitation, he focused on a learner’s mindset. As he says, it wasn’t his plan to become the superintendent, in fact, he didn’t even have his superintendent’s license, however, once he was appointed to the role, Doherty wanted to make sure that his ability to be vulnerable was a key aspect of his service.

“I wanted to make sure that in my leadership, I came to the table as, ‘I’m that type of vulnerable person who’s not going to have all the answers, but I’m going to work really hard to do whatever it takes for the best interests of our students and staff.’”

Dr. Doherty started his career in education at a place he says many people might not know of. His first job in education was as an intern at the Missouri Botanical Garden, where he felt that he really refined his teaching skills. He taught environmental science, ecology, and outdoor education at the Botanical Garden, working with students from public schools across the St. Louis region.

“I took every opportunity I could to learn what it meant to be a great teacher [...] I felt

25

like that experience was the grounding for me to be a highly effective teacher.” Doherty then started in Webster Groves as a third-grade teacher, later moving again to teach third grade at Green Trails Elementary School in the Parkway School District, following the former principal from Webster Groves who had taken a new position there.

“I had the opportunity to be an assistant principal at that school and I really made sure that if I moved into a different role, that I always remained as a teacher first, because I think that the role of a teacher is so integral to a student’s success, and I always made sure I focused on being a strong learner and teacher.”

After serving as assistant principal, Doherty ended up being principal at Green Trails, serving there for 11 years altogether.

“At the end of my 11 years, I decided that one of the ways I could stretch was to put myself in a different context.”

He says his move to Captain Elementary from Parkway was about growing and pushing himself.

“It was about applying my skills in a different way and it was a great move for me. I went to Captain Elementary as the principal and what an incredible experience I had,” Doherty said.

“One of the things that was really great is that it was like a do-over. All the things that I had learned about being a principal in my former district and all the mistakes I made, I was able to remember those and apply that learning to

a different context. I had such a tremendous experience there. The connections and relationships I made with the families in that community and the teachers are things that are going to be long-lasting with me.”

Doherty’s passion for teaching stemmed from his own experiences in high school. In 2018, Doherty spoke at the WOW Speaker Series at Clayton High School. In his speech, Doherty says he initially wanted to be an architect, an aspiration he discovered from a love of drawing. However, in his senior year of high school, he volunteered at a local elementary school to fulfill service hours.

“It was in that experience where I was -- I had this kind of epiphany that [...] I didn’t want to be an architect. I want to be in a classroom. I want to be a teacher.”

Realizing his passion for teaching filled him with excitement; excitement that wasn’t shared by family members. “I remember feeling so defeated thinking that this thing that I was so excited about was now, kind of, not a reality.” After a sort of dismissal by his family, he started at the University of Missouri-St. Louis to fulfill his architecture prerequisites.

In his speech, he shares a piece of wisdom, “Taking risks leads you to new paths and allows you to realize aspects of yourself you did not know.”

After a year at UMSL, feeling unmotivated, he took a trip to Europe with a friend, a trip he mentions in his retirement letter. “When I was nineteen years old, I bought a one-way ticket to London. At that point in my life, I had never been on a plane or traveled outside of the midwest,” writes Doherty.

“It was during that experience–my personal gap year–that I decided to pursue my interest in teaching. I knew that education was my passion. That trip gave me the confidence to follow it. I continue to be grateful for the important decision I made back then.”

He now says that his own risk-taking is leading him to pursue new adventures. “I don’t know if we do this enough in our own lives where we just stop and then take a risk and see what else is out there and I think that’s how we grow. That’s what I’m doing.

I have the opportunity to retire and I really don’t like the word ‘retire’ because I think people have a mindset about that. But, I’m going to determine what’s next for me and how I have impact in a new way.”

Pinned to a whiteboard in Doherty’s office is a piece of white paper with the word “YET” printed in large, bold font. “I keep that YET visible in my office as a constant reminder to have a growth mindset with every aspect of my work,” writes Doherty in an email. He says in the face of adversity, he is reminded to think, “I have not accomplished it YET.”

“ I HAV E NOT ACCOM PLISHED I T Y E T.”

T D .”

M IK E K ANA AN Mike Kanaan, CHS Band Director/ Woodwind specialist, had his first introduction to teaching from his mom, who was a special education teacher. He’d see her come and hear her stories, and that along with his love for music since he was young, came together perfectly. He’s taught for 30 years, and spent 17 of them teaching here, at CHS. When Kanaan started here, the difference from previous school districts he’s taught at was startling. Typically, sports were in the highlight and being “smart” was bad, but CHS it was nearly the opposite.“ Here, everyone supports everyone and pushes everyone,” Kanaan says, “everyone wants to achieve.”

Not only does he value the mindset here, he values his students. Kanaan made it his goal to build good relationships with his students above all else, “If you have a [good] relationship with a student, they’ll walk on water for you.” This sentiment really shines through when you learn that his one of his favorite parts of teaching here were the band trips for festivals, where the band teachers would spend whole weekends with students, on buses and in hotels and theatres.

A student Kanaan has had for 3 years is Kailyn Rhimes, a CHS freshman that plays clarinet. Kailyn says that he is one of the reasons she’s still in band, since Kanaan teaches a lot about different things, but takes the time to follow the pace of his students,

“H E M A DE IT F U N TO M A K E M US IC .”

rather than what’s ‘expected’. “He’s a great teacher, and really fun to be around. We can tell him anything.” Having the same teacher for years brings a lot of fun experiences, and a particularly memorable one Kailyn has was in 7th grade, “There was a running joke that I could say how many jokes he could make per class period, which was really funny.”

Jackson Swinigan is a senior who’s been playing alto saxophone since he was in 6th grade. Kanaan is one of his favorite teachers, and much like Kailyn, says Kanaan is one of the reasons he likes music as much as he does “He made it fun to make music.” Kanaan’s value in relationships can be seen from the “other side” here, with Jackson saying that some of his favorite memories with Kanaan are from the band trips, too. Kanaan’s described by Jackson as really laid back, really supportive teacher. “He’s someone you can go to if you’re having a problem- music or otherwise.”

As he’s leaving the district, Kanaan wants his students to continue with the pursuit of music, and to know that music is a life long skill, and that they should nurture it. “I know people in their 90s playing in groups,” he says, “it’s lifelong.”

26

richard horas Rain or shine, Richard Horas can be found biking to CHS all the way from his home in South St. Louis. “I’ll pull up next to him and roll down my window and say, ‘Hey Rick!

You want a ride?’ and he’s like, ‘No way, man!

I love this!’” said David Aiello, a colleague of his for over 30 years. By 7:15, Horas is in his classroom preparing for his classes, ready for a full day of teaching history students.

A native of the area, Richard Horas grew up in South St. Louis. After majoring in History and earning a Masters degree in Liberal Arts as well as Technology in Education, he began teaching at DeSmet High School. “I thought I would become a teacher probably during my junior year of college,” said Horas, “I enjoyed school and I enjoy playing sports and I enjoyed learning and being around other people. I thought education could allow me to continue to pursue those passions.”

Although Horas took an interest in both history and English, history was his beacon of light. “I felt, in the end, history had more ‘substance’ to it. I was tired of people reciting their opinions about great works of literature with no evidence to back them up.”

Horas started teaching in the Clayton district in 1987 at Wydown Middle School.

“It is actually a strange story on how I wound up teaching at Wydown. In 1987 I was teaching in Kathmandu, Nepal, and my teaching job was about to end. I got a call from a friend of mine from DeSmet high school and he told me that Wydown Middle School was looking for teachers and that Paul Drury, his friend, wanted to interview me. So I set up a phone call from Kathmandu,” said Horas.

After teaching at the middle school for a few years, he and his wife went to work for the Peace Corps in Mongolia. It was when he returned that he began teaching at Clayton High. Now, it has been 32 years.

“It’s also been a challenging and demanding job,” said Horas, “There are no days off in the classroom. There are classes to prepare, papers to grade, and sometimes very long hours. But I think that the long hours are probably true of any job you take on as a career. Any job, that is, that you dedicate yourself to.” And Horas has certainly been a dedicated teacher. Taking on many responsibilities outside of the classroom including being a soccer coach and the Missouri State Teachers Association (MSTA) president. “I’m going to miss his presence as the MSTA president,” said Aiello, “It’s a thankless job, you don’t get any pay, you don’t get any benefits out of it other than what the organization brings to you.

Mr. Horas was our voice. He represented a large number of us to the school and to the administration... I don’t know how many other people are willing to step in and do that. Those will be very big shoes

to fill.” Horas has also been the proclaimed technology expert in the Social Studies Department. “Back in the ‘90s when we all started getting computers… Mr. Horas was somebody who just took to that and he was definitely our go-to guy in our department for many of our technology needs which is really important because we only have one technology person for the whole building,” said Aiello.

In the classroom, Horas has also been known for his exceptional organizational skills, specifically his unit packets, a student favorite. “He gives his students these wonderful packets for each unit that is a place for them to fill in and take some notes as they go through each one of the units… freshmen aren’t always the most organized, so I think his ability to help them has been something that has been really valuable for students over the years,” said Aiello.

Horas also likes to make his classroom a space, not just for taking notes, but to get students actually engaged in the material.

“I love to get my students involved!” said Horas, “I love controversial class discussions, particularly debates. I like it when my students take on the roles of historical figures. I like to challenge my students’ thinking. I love to sing in class. I love to read a good essay. I love it when my students laugh (usually at me)! I love a well-written test response-- It lets me know that my students are learning. It reminds me of why I got into this business: to help students become better thinkers and better writers.”

Everyday, Horas brings his passion for history and teaching into his classroom. “He has a quirky sense of humor,” said Aiello, “He likes to have some fun with history and social studies. He likes to make some jokes.

Sometimes kids can’t always tell when he’s joking for a while and takes them a few

T H E R E A R E N O D AY S O F

minutes for them to catch on, but that helps them to remember things.”

But never complacent in his teaching style, Horas always searches for new ways to improve the education of his students.

“He is constantly learning new ideas that he can somehow bring into the classroom.

Sometimes it’s about the content of the courses he teaches, but a lot of the time, it’s what we call pedagogy-- how do you teach, how do you help students learn,” said Aiello, “I remember about ten years ago, he was the first person that we knew that read the book called ‘Make it Stick.’ All about the testing effect, it was the research into how memory works. He was super excited about reading this… He shared that with our department.

We discussed it and had [the authors] come in and talk with us, and that has made a big difference in how I teach my classes.”

Horas has had a fulfilling career. “It’s been a great experience,” he said, “I have taught literally hundreds of wonderful students.

I’ve taught classes I love, and I’ve worked with some great people.” However, after forty years of teaching, Horas is ready to take on new challenges. “I have enough money. I would love to do more travelling. I’m tired of working 12-hour days (occasionally), grading papers, attending meetings . . . I also think it’s time to step aside and let someone who knows what TikTok is teach.” Horas’ favorite time period to teach was the Age of Exploration-- “I would love to have travelled with Magellan around the world!” he said.

Now, he will have the opportunity to be an explorer himself. “I hope to buy a big van and take my dog, Maisy, to visit old friends as well as 14 different mountain biking towns throughout the United States,” said Horas, “National Geographic put out an article about four years ago on the 20 top mountain biking towns in the US. My dog and I visited three on our trip to California two summers ago and we visited three more on a trip to Virginia last summer. We have 14 more to go.

My wife is still working so it looks like it’s just ‘Travels with Maisy!’”

Horas will also have the chance to spend more time with his family. “I take great pride in my children,” said Horas, a father of two boys, Mathew and Gabe, and a girl, Hannah, “While I could never paint a masterpiece like Michelangelo, I consider my children to be beautiful works of art whom my wife and I have had a hand in creating.”

Sometime at the end of the school year, Richard Horas will take his last bike ride to CHS. “Most importantly, I’ll just miss him as a friend,” said Aiello, “We are kindred spirits.

We share a lot of the same passions and goals, and we probably spend more waking hours here than we spend with our families.”

“Teaching never gets easy,” said Horas, “I’ve learned that the vast majority of the students I teach year in and year out want to be successful. I’ve learned that a job is what you make it. Overall, I’ve learned that the relationships that I had with my students and my fellow teachers made it all so worthwhile!”

kim shelley “My older brother David played percussion,” said CHS band director Kim Shelley. “[...] David used to put the drum set out on the front porch, because Mom always said it was too loud. So I was always following David around in diapers–there are pictures of me in my diapers and my cowboy hat.”

Music has always been a big part of Shelley’s life, and she began taking piano lessons in elementary school.

“I had a love-hate relationship with the piano. I would like it, then I’d want to quit, so my parents let me quit and then a few months later I’d want to have piano lessons again, and that went off and on,” said Shelley.

In sixth grade, Shelley was keen on playing the french horn in the beginning band.

Unfortunately, she couldn’t play because of an orthodontic dilemma.”

“So I did percussion because my brother taught me a whole bunch of stuff. I already knew rudiments and all, so I was already there. I did that for a while in sixth grade and I got bored because I was way ahead of the game. I asked my band director, “Can I do something else?” and so he let me play trombone and baritone, until I was a freshman in high school, and then I was like okay, I kind of sound like my dad’s electric razor,” said Shelley.

She decided that percussion was the route she wanted to take. Shelley started taking private lessons during her freshman and sophomore year. She then auditioned and started performing with the Youth Orchestra.

Shelley joined the St. Louis Symphony when she was 19 and played for 13 years as an extra percussionist.

“So I feel like I had 13 years of a great education. I got to go to Europe with them a bunch of times. I performed in over 25 different recordings with the symphony.

When we won a Grammy, I got to hold the Grammy. So I am 1/64 of a Grammy owner.

It was a lot of fun,” said Shelley.

She was later accepted into Julliard, and she still has her acceptance letter hanging up in the band office.

A college friend recommended that she come help him with his students at LadueWatkins High School. Shelley got into teaching private lessons and percussion ensembles. She then worked as a percussion mentor at Parkway West and Lindenwood College.

“It was easy to have a 12-14 hour day, and I’m thinking, this is great but I don’t know if I want to sustain this for the rest of my life.

The more and more I started liking teaching,

I thought that maybe I should make the switch,” said Shelley.

“I went out to Flagstaff, Arizona, where they had this accelerated program for people who already had degrees but wanted to get their teacher certification. I went out there and within two semesters, I had my certificate to teach. They took all my transcripts and turned out I was able to get a third edge, an actual education degree,” said Shelley. She began to teach at Clayton High School in 2002.

Building the percussion program was no easy task, it took a lot of stamina to keep up with the schedules of weekend rehearsals, performances, preparing for auditions, etc.

“As you build a program, it becomes a double-edged sword because it takes more time. But it’s a labor of love, a total labor of love,” said Shelley.

“I always wanted to teach percussion and band and music based on not only the curriculum, but the life skills you learn in the process. [...] And I just want this quarter.

I just want to kick back and enjoy and just be with them (students), it’s been very accentuated for me being away because of COVID,” said Shelley. “(I will miss) the students, being around you guys. There’s something fun about as you get older it’s nice to be around young people” said Shelley.

The MMEA concert was definitely one of the highlights for Shelley as well.

“That was probably the height of teaching for me, in terms of validation in some sort of external validation, I mean internally, every year has been awesome. It was an external validation from the state that rocked. When we submitted our tapes for percussion ensembles we were also submitting our tapes against college level percussion ensembles,” said Shelley.

OF F IN T HE CL A S S R OOM.

“There was this Dr. Seuss book, All About Me, I think it was called, and it just was a way for kids to fill out all these dreams,” remembered CHS English teacher John Ryan.

“I wanted to be a cartoonist,” he laughed.

“I guess that notion of creating kind of has pervaded everything I do.”

Inspired by a love for his high school English classes at Saint Louis University High School, Ryan eventually left his picture-book dreams behind to major in English at Mizzou and become a writer. A minor in Spanish later became a double major when he had the opportunity to study abroad in Spain.

“The influence of those teachers [in Spain] might have been part of my reasoning to go into teaching, really, but I wasn’t conscious of that at the time,” he said, recalling how his Spanish teachers fostered the kind of authentic classroom environment that he now strives to create as a teacher himself.

Ryan’s path to becoming a teacher started with teaching Spanish at an after-school program and English as a second language to adults through the Parkway school district.

He later substitute taught at Clayton–an experience which he described as “kind of a disaster but also fun”–before observing, student teaching and eventually starting as a teacher in 1996.

Ryan later served as chair of the English department, CHS representative for the National Education Association and cosponsor of National Honor Society. He has also pursued writing professionally, publishing poems and short stories in literary magazines and anthologies. In 2015, the voracious reader published his own book, a private eye novel.

Since his days as a student teacher ended, Ryan’s CHS career has spanned 24 years.

Though he admitted that he has been less in touch with teen culture since his two daughters graduated from high school, he is known for his empathy and care for his students.

“I think I did make a difference for some of them,” he said, reflecting on the connections he made with his students who faced academic or emotional struggles.

“It’s very difficult to be a student,” Ryan said. “It’s difficult to be an adolescent, and then to be a student on top of it, and then to be in a place like this, with the pressures that are here. So while I’m obviously a participant in it and I also give lots of work to my students, my hope is that I have some humor and humanity about it, and that they feel that too.” Since his first teaching job, Ryan’s approach to education has been shaped by a dedication to humor and humanity in the classroom. His fellow teachers have observed this commitment to inspiring and engaging those around him.

“It always makes me feel valued to be in his presence,” said English teacher Amy Hamilton, who remembers how Ryan was the first person to reach out to her when she started at CHS. “I admire the fact that he’s a writer, that he’s written a book, that he during professional development is always willing to share his writing or something that has inspired him.”

Hamilton also described the power of Ryan’s demeanor as a teacher.

“He is able to lead and to share and to inspire with a...I don’t even know if I would call it a quiet voice, but he’s calm,” she said.

Despite his calm approach to teaching, Ryan remembers being “rebellious and resistant to authority” in grade school.

“I do think it’s important to question authority, it’s important to think critically, think for oneself. Those are important values,” he said.

Over the years at Clayton, Ryan has observed educational and social shifts that mirror societal trends over the past two decades. For example, he pointed to the passage of the No Child Left Behind Act in 2001 as an educational development that “utterly shifted the focus of schools away from what I would call the humane, the humanity, and to test prep.” The Bush-era legislation, which made federal funding for school districts more dependent on standardized assessments, has been criticized for placing too much emphasis on test scores.

“For a while, Clayton didn’t have to really worry about end-of-course exams and MAP

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tests,” Ryan explained. “But as soon as those began to be tied to other things, then we began to care a whole lot. And so it was that time period plus a real serious economic downturn, early 2000s, that changed the culture.”

Ryan has also seen Clayton itself evolve as a community.

“There used to be more affordable housing in Clayton and there’s just not anymore, and all the new construction is really expensive condos and such. So that’s fine, Clayton’s doing what it wants to do. But when I started, there were students who lived in single story homes, ranch houses,” he said. “So I’m a little concerned about the socioeconomic shift, as well as fewer students who are part of the voluntary transfer program.”

After teaching through two economic recessions, the rise of social media, a global pandemic, and a national shift in the educational funding and standardized testing system, one trend stands out to Ryan among his students.

“I see a great reluctance to be wrong. A fear of being wrong,” he said. “A fear of risking giving an answer that might be off the mark.”

Ryan described how students feel the need to make disclaimers or apologize for their contributions to class discussions, even when he knows they have valuable things to add.

“That’s a concern because because we need risk takers, we need people who are going to be creative and not robots,” he explained. As he moves on from CHS, he hopes to see more investment in and recognition of the value of creative art.

Hamilton reflected that commitment to the importance of teaching literature has been one of the most important things she has learned from Ryan.

“I think one of the things I will always take with me is that literature and studying literature is valuable, it’s integral to all human beings, and that we get to fight for that, and we have to fight for that, and to never feel ashamed to advocate the position that studying literature is really really really important,” she said.

Ryan also holds strong convictions about the importance of public education as a whole.

“I would love to see a national shift, a valuing of the impact teachers make, paying them accordingly, funding schools accordingly,” he said. “Making school funding more equitable, so that a kid who lives in the inner city can have a chance at a great education.”

Over the last decade, Ryan has observed a growing sentiment against public education and the teachers who fight for it. But despite the added challenges teachers have faced throughout the pandemic, Ryan plans to stay involved in education. He hopes to continue his writing career, as well as to teach community college or work in under-served communities.

“It’s still funny to me, that word retirement,” he laughed. “I’m retiring from teaching full time, but I’m not retiring.”

s t e p h a n ie m a r t in Spanish teacher Stephanie Martin greets her students every day with a cheerful “Buenos Dias,” and although she wears a mask, her smile and energy always shine through. Despite the gloomy mood and frustrating isolation that many have experienced during the long duration of the COVID-19 pandemic, Sra. Martin makes a passionate and dedicated effort to encourage and support students.

A St. Louis native, Martin grew up in Shrewsberry where she attended St. Michaels before moving on to another Catholic school for high school. Since her youth, education has always played an integral role in Martin’s life. Inspired by her parents as a child, she knew as a girl that she was destined for higher education and a life of learning. “[My mom] must have been dyslexic, and reading was really hard for her and she felt that she wasn’t smart so she didn’t go to college. My dad was incredibly smart and the oldest of 11. Growing up as a Depression baby, as soon as he could he helped to support the family.”

During her time in high school, Martin took several years of Spanish classes because it was required, but the idea of pursuing a Spanish degree, and much less the idea of becoming a teacher, never crossed her mind.

Having a passion for literature and writing, she decided to major in English when she went to college, and after continuing to take a few Spanish classes, she decided to double major. Martin’s life in college proved to be a time of great exploration that led her to open her mind to paths she had not considered before. During a semester while she was taking a political science class she was introduced to a wealth of new information regarding the history and politics of the United States. From this class she began to take a more critical view of the United States, as it was the first time she was taught about certain aspects of the nation’s controversial foregin policy decisions. It also gave her a more nuanced view of world issues, thus facilitating her studies in Spanish. “[That exploration] was very crucial as I continued my studies in Spanish. Especially with this literature that I’ve come to love. You really understand the relation it has with the politics and the socio-economic realities of Latin America.”

In her junior year of college, Martin decided to take her love for the Spanish language abroad. “Once I decided that I was

going to double major, I thought, ‘If I say I have a major in this I better be pretty fluent.’

I had a really good scholarship for undergrad and that applied to study abroad, so it was easy and affordable to go and it ended up changing my life.”

Upon returning to the United States, Martin was still unsure of what she wanted to pursue after graduating. When her friend majoring in math mentioned that she wanted to become a teacher, Martin nearly stood aghast, promptly responding, “Why would you want to be a teacher? I mean, no money, no respect, why would you want to do that?”

As life took its turns, Martin says, her priorities and goals shifted slightly.

“After I met my husband on my junior year abroad I went to Spain on a one-way ticket after graduating. I married my husband and lived there.” While living in Spain with her new husband, Martin, putting aside her previous doubts, began to teach English to Spanish-speaking professionals. However, when she moved back to the U.S., teaching was still not in the forefront of her mind.

After having a couple of jobs that she didn’t like, Martin began working for a company in customer service dealing with salespeople, partly directed toward a Miami market.

While she was able to occasionally use her well-developed Spanish skills, she became bored after several months on the job and found it relatively unfulfilling.

Breaking away from a path that she had initially planned to go down was a somewhat difficult and confusing process of selfdiscovery, but Martin realized that teaching was the one thing she knew would constantly challenger her and push her to be a life-long learner. She always knew that as a peopleperson, laboratory work or other isolating professions would not suit her.

“After about three months I got really bored, and I thought, ‘I never got bored being a teacher,’ and so that’s when I went to Washington University and got my masters and certifications.” Martin says while the aspect of constant learning and collaboration was the reason she entered teaching, the meaningful relationships she has built with her co-workers and students is what has really kept her in the profession for over 30 years.

“When I started in Clayton, I started at the high school and I taught here for four years.

After that fourth year we were going to begin

the elementary Spanish program, so that summer I went and spent time in Minnesota being trained in elementary methods, and then I went and taught at Meramec for eight years. [The district] asked me to come back to the high school when that very first group of first graders were going to be ninth graders here. So, a handful of these kids who I had for five years at Meramec I also had for three years here, and I will still get an occasional postcard or call or something from some of those kids.”

Martin’s first teaching job, however, was not with the Clayton School District but with University City High School. After a year there she received a full time offer from Clayton and an offer from Kirkwood High School for a position where she would only work four-fifths of the time. Someone else in her position may have jumped at the chance to teach at Clayton, but being a new and idealistic teacher, Martin was initially held back by her preconceived notions.

“I kind of saw [Clayton] as a stuck up place with these stuck up kids. That was my impression of Clayton before I came. I didn’t know! You’re young and you want to change the world and make a difference, and I thought, ‘What difference can I make with these affluent, spoiled kids?’”

Martin soon fell in love with the district and its students. “I was totally being judgemental on my part. I can’t tell you how much love I have for my students. They are some of the most culturally and socially aware and giving and generous people I have ever met.” Over decades of teaching Martin has seen Clayton’s language department grow and improve to become what it is today. In addition, she has experienced growth as an educator and become more compassionate and understanding towards parents.

As her time with the Clayton School District comes to a close, Martin looks forward to spending time with her family and friends, and plans to take a month-long trip to Spain starting in mid August. She hopes to stay an active learner and is considering exploring various creative tasks during retirement.

“I think I might explore some curriculum writing or materials writing. I’m thinking that I will sub sometimes because I will miss my colleagues and students.”

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Chris Moody modeled his teaching career after one question: “What do they need to know, and how do I need to deliver it?” After 20 years of teaching at CHS, Moody has asked this question to himself countless times.

As a child, Mr. Moody enjoyed helping people learn.

“I enjoyed helping people understand things, and that just carried forward to teaching.”

But, by his sophomore year in high school, he knew that he wanted to be a teacher.

“I didn’t settle on math until my junior year because I realized I was pretty good at it, and math teachers looked to have the most fun. I said to myself ‘If I want to do this, I want to have fun.’ and I was right, math teachers do have the most fun.”

Moody also said that teaching is genetic in his family, with his grandfathers being college professors, and his grandmothers being a fourth grade teacher and an administrative assistant. He jokes, “It was like I was destined to do this.”

Moody’s first teaching job was at Francis Howell North High School. “I got that job late July before the school year started, so I did not have a lot of prep time. I was flying blind for about this first month. Convincing kids that I knew what I was doing was a big part of the job at that point. It was very much sink or swim, but it taught me how to be a teacher and command the classroom.”

Francis Howell North served as a way for Moody to learn how to work with hundreds of students, and learn what teaching was about. But, most importantly, his first job taught him that teaching is about “teaching the information and making [the students] believe you know what you’re doing.”

His first year teaching at CHS was in 2000.

“When I left my old district, I was looking for a place that would allow me to experiment a little bit more with how I generated and delivered the curriculum.”

And although that was what drew Moody to the Clayton district, ultimately what made his experience so special was the people. “Math has the most fun,” he jokes, “but we also work really well together. We are all very similar in

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[ T E A C H IN G A N D LE A R N IN G ] A LLO W S US T O M O V E F O R WA R D. IT A LLO W S US T O M A K E S U R E T H E T H IN G S T H AT W E VA LU E A R E G O IN G T O B E PA R T O F O U R W O R LD.

chris moody

our temperament and process for doing things.”

But, the staff weren’t the only people that deserved some credit. “I’ve worked with some fantastic kids. With kids that are motivated and really fun to work with. Their genuine enthusiasm for wanting to accomplish things, to me, is the biggest thing about this district.”

Moody goes on to explain how being a teacher in a school environment shaped his mentality on life. “[Being a teacher] helped me understand the benefits and consequences of the level of work that you put into a task. If you work hard, you are going to have good results.

If you decide not to work hard, you won’t have good results. And I have been on both sides of that spectrum, both in my personal life and professional career, in terms of teaching and what I did as a student.”

To sum it up, as long as someone tries their best, any result can be seen as a success or learning opportunity.

“I know the direct link between work and result. And, I know the importance of struggle and sometimes failure to help you move forward.”

Being a teacher made Moody able to appreciate the importance behind education and teaching that he didn’t fully acknowledge when he started all those years ago. “[Teaching and learning] allows us to move forward. It allows us to make sure the things that we value are going to be part of our world.

It allows us to advance. It allows us to solve problems. It allows us to understand the human condition. If you don’t have a solid education those things will start to get lost.”

He explains how current events prove lack of learning while in school results in many people and their problems ending up lost. “[Students] are too valuable of a resource to not be given everything [educators] have.”

In his 20 year career at CHS, Moody has taught thousands of students, and has connected to many students on a personal level. His dedication to his many students is seen through his early hours and late nights answering emails, setting up meetings, and clearing up questions.

Any students who has ever been taught

by Moody can feel his compassion towards his students as soon as they step into the classroom. He has not only impacted the students, but the other teachers at CHS as well. His humor, organization skills, confusing memes, and home cooked food in the math office will be dearly missed as well.

david kohmetscher David Kohmetscher described himself a, growing up in Lansing, Michigan, “A good student… a strong student… but more an athlete than a student.” Kohmetscher’s high school in Lansing was about three times the size of Clayton, and while not quite as rigorously academic, much more focused on athletics.

Athletics helped to define Kohmetscher’s education and career, as he began college swimming D1 for Ohio State. However, his college path, athletic career, and major were anything but direct.

“I spent two and a half years at Ohio State as an aerospace engineering major, and then kind of hopped around. I blew my shoulder out in my second year at Ohio State and ended up going back to Michigan State where my father was a professor,” said Kohmetscher.

“I spent a year there, then decided to swim again. So, I transferred to Iowa, hopped around from computer science and eventually ended up with math education.”

Math education clicked with Kohmetscher, and it correlated to his love for coaching.

“I mean, I just loved math as a topic,” explained Kohmetscher. “As soon as I started taking the education courses, I loved teaching, I loved coaching, I loved interaction with athletes and students. It kind of just seems a natural progression to get into helping people learn things.”

Unlike Kohmetscher’s route to higher education, however, his teaching career has been much more straightforward. He arrived at Clayton soon after the culmination of his competitive swimming career, when he placed third in the ‘88 Olympic swimming trials.

“I was up in Iowa City, and the classic long-term coach, Wally Lundt, was leaving.

The athletic director started calling around to some programs around the neighboring

states to try and find out if they had anybody with an education background that could coach.”

Kohmetscher fit the description, and started at Clayton in 1992. He worked in the Learning Center and coaching Boys and Girls swimming and water polo. Since ‘92, he’s been the coach of the boys and girls swimming and water polo teams almost every year— 26 of the 29 he’s been in the district, only taking a few years off to focus on family.

“I think in my 29 years, we’ve had five state champion individuals. This past year, I think our girls swim team placed the highest of any other year, I think we got fifth at state….

If there was anything really tugging me to stay, we set a state record this year in the 200 medley relay with three freshmen and a junior.”

Aside from coaching, Kohmetscher has also dedicated just about three decades to the Clayton High School math department.

“I’ve taught a whole myriad of math classes… almost every class except for a geometry course, and maybe honors precalc… but I think one of the things I’m most proud of academically is introducing the AP statistics course to Clayton.”

The AP statistics course, now a staple for Clayton students interested in math and data, was introduced by Kohmetscher in the late 90s. A passion of his, Kohmetscher argues that statistics is just as vital as other more popular facets of the curriculum.

“I always felt statistics was one of the most

important mathematical courses. I think calculus gets a great name, and everybody wants to get to calculus, but for at least 15 or 20 years now Stats has been required for more college majors than calculus… back then, it just seemed like it was about time, so I made a course proposal and the math department was behind it.”

To round off his teaching repertoire, Kohmetscher has also been active in the computer science courses at CHS, from teaching a C+ course in the early 2000s to leading the AP Computer Science A class for the past five years.

Overall, Kohmetscher is more than satisfied with his time at Clayton.

“I think it’s a great place to work simply because the students are interested in learning,” said Kohmetscher. “By and large, most students are interested in learning the content— they have a desire, a passion to learn…. Parents in this community, kids in this community, value education, and it makes it a great place to be.”

Kohmetscher plans to spend time with family, moving out to the Seattle area to be with his father (and somewhat ironically leave his daughter in St. Louis, finishing up her doctorate in occupational therapy at WashU).

“If anything, it’s been a constant that the district has trusted teachers to do the right thing in the classroom, given the necessary tools to do it,” said Kohmestcher. “I could not have picked a better place to spend nearly 30 years teaching.”

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u l pa “Dr. Varley is all about being a good person and having integrity,” said Jennifer Shenberger, one of Dr. Paul Varley’s coworkers at Wydown. “He wants to instill that in his students and he does that through his stories. From common gestures of not wearing a hat in the building or making sure you can make eye contact and shake somebody’s hand and say pleasant things, you’ll never hear [him] say anything negative about anybody.”

Paul Varley, who has taught music for 43 years, has a strong background history in music. “We always did music in my family,” Varley said. “My uncle’s wife played organ, so we all stood around it and sang,” he added.

By singing with his family and listening to big band music, Varley was inspired to go into music as a career. During his freshman year of high school, he made a decision to become a music teacher.

“I just really enjoyed being in band,” Varley said. Once Varley gained the confidence to be a teacher, he couldn’t decide whether he wanted to teach band or math. While he really enjoyed being in band class, he also had a likeable math teacher. “I was wondering if I wanted to teach math, or to teach music, and thought music would be more fun,” said Varley, who chose music as his best subject.

Varley taught band at Wydown Middle School for the past 29 years. Not only did he teach music, but he also shared several personal stories of his to the class.

“He talked a lot about going to Penn State,” said CHS sophomore Isabella Bamnolker (‘23). Varley remembered his experience

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starting off quite rough at Penn State. He auditioned for the marching blue band at the university, but he didn’t get in.

Although Varley never made it into the marching band his freshman year, his director encouraged him to re-audition the next year, expecting to see him in the band.

Therefore, he auditioned a second time, and gladly made it through. Not only did he play in the marching band, but he also joined other bands throughout his college experience.

“I played in the German band, jazz band, and the dixieland band,” Varley said.

While Varley had many music experiences through his education, his work as a teacher makes him a very honorable gentleman, especially around other teachers in the Clayton district.

“Anytime there’s a new director in the district, the first thing he does is invites them and their family over to his house for dinner,” said Shenberger, remembering how Varley would always invite a teacher who was brand new to the district over to his house.

One of the teachers that Varley invited was WMS Choir Teacher, Nicholas Urvan, during his first year in the district, in 2016.

“When Mr. Urvan first came to teach in Clayton, I invited him over for supper and he brought his wife Hannah,” Varley said.

Once he started a conversation with Mr. Urvan’s wife, he ultimately found out that she attended school in the Clayton district. Thus, Varley discovered that Hannah was one of his students. “She told me her maiden name and I was like, ‘You played flute!’”

Varley has the advantage of taking

responsibility for his actions and the actions of others. When he took a high school marching band to Florida, he and his students stopped at a convenience store in Georgia so that they could get something to eat. He remembered that one of the employees said to him that too many kids couldn’t be allowed in the store at once because it was like “a bull running through a china shop.” Because the employee was afraid that too many kids would cause a hassle in the store, Varley made a promise to her.

“These are really good kids,” Varley said to the employee. “If you let them in, nothing will go wrong. And if something does go wrong, I’ll pay for it out of my own pocket.”

After the employee received these words from Varley, she rightfully let all of the students in, and they got what they needed to eat without causing any trouble.

Once all the students went back onto the bus, the employee came up to Varley and said, “Sir, I’m so sorry. This was a wonderful group of kids and anytime you come back this way, we’ll be more than happy to have you come in.”

In general, Varley sees teaching students as a very important part of his life.

“He has the ability to impact positively the lives of students if he comes in contact with them,” said Shenberger. In his 43 years of teaching, Varley led many of his students to choose to play music, not only through high school, but also in college. Because of his impact on students, Varley is recognized for being a wonderful guide for many of their futures.

“He was inspiring a lot of kids to follow their dreams,” said Bamnolker.

G

Most Clayton students only visit Gene Gladstone in panic. Realizing they need a Chromebook minutes before a test, they scramble into his room, trading phones, licenses, or anything of value for a Chromebook. However, in moments of less rush, students can find Mr. Gladstone tucked inside his office, full of stories and advice for anyone who stops by.

Surrounded by education from a young age, Gladstone frequently tagged alongside his father, a high school teacher and principal, at Southwest High School. From these experiences, Gladstone knew he wanted to be a teacher, and “there was zero deflection from that path” during his college career.

His teaching career officially began in the Mehlville School District, where he taught “dirty shop”: working with molten metal and other materials. Evaluating his surroundings at this time, Gladstone predicted his field’s shift to become more computer orientated, possibly leading to the cut of these programs.

This awareness led him to his next career, where he earned certification as a math and science teacher and continued as one for the large part of his career.

Interestingly enough, Gladstone’s introduction to technology was due to his initial involvement in math and science.

“Back in the day, science teachers and math teachers were the most likely people to use a computer [...] so a principal would come to a math teacher like me and say ‘hey can you troubleshoot this’ and if you said yes, you probably got to do that more and more.”

Gladstone continued saying “yes” and joined Clayton in 2011 as Education Technologist, helping better integrate technology into students’ and teachers’ everyday experiences.

During his years working with technology, Gladstone has noted some large changes in the view and role of technology. “What I’ve seen over the span of time is technology has gone from being an add on -- something schools would buy as a shiny new thing -- to something that’s really embedded a critical component of what everybody does.”

This technological change has transcended district lines, affecting all school districts.

However, in his time at Clayton, Gladstone noticed factors that set Clayton apart from other high schools.

“The interaction between teachers and students is respectful on both sides; you don’t necessarily see that at other schools, where teachers are respectful to and curious about their students,” Gladstone said.

This mutual respect between teachers and students partly lends to Gladstone’s next observation.

“Past the demographics and all that kind of stuff that’s really easy to quantify, the thing I’ve noticed is when you walk in the building, it’s calm,” Gladstone said, “There is either a serenity or an anxiety that keeps you calm, I’m not sure what it is, but it’s very evident.”

GENE

Clayton’s calm juxtaposes other excitement Gladstone has experienced in his career.

Gladstone’s impressive career is not limited to teaching; he also departs from the world of education as a decorated football coach.

He coached fifteen years at Lindbergh High School, fifteen years at Vianney High School, and lastly two years at Clayton High School His numerous accolades include an induction in the St. Louis Coaches Association Hall of Fame, title as two-time Coach of the Year, and a position as former president of the St. Louis Metro Coaches association.

He speaks fondly of his time coaching, describing many of his stand out memories from Clayton occurring while involved in the football program.

“I can think in particular of the first game we played as a new team, and one kid who just had a super game and scored a touchdown was so emotional because his mom got to come to see him. She’d never seen a play before. And, it’s just one of those moments that blow up when you’re experiencing somebody else’s joy.”

Gladstone transfers his coaching attitude towards his daily work, choosing to tackle any problems that come his way.

“Being the dumbest guy in the room is the best position to be in. [...] So I always walk in the room as the dumbest guy in the room which means you always learn something when you want. So every place I go around here, every new day is something new that I learned,” Gladstone said.

Gladstone’s positive attitude extends beyond himself, inspiring others around him. Head librarian Lauran DeRegine said,

“If there’s a work issue or even raising kids, [Gladstone] has that coach mentality where he will coach you through it. And he’s also always that positive outlet.”

In mentioning Gladstone’s overall positive effect on the CHS community, DeRigne emphasized the legacy Gladstone hopes to leave.

“My first year here, I had a sign up that said ‘Find a Way to Say Yes’. And that would be kind of cool if people thought this was a guy who always tried to find a way to make the things we needed to happen happen. And that I was able to build relationships with students and teachers that were really positive and help them grow, help me grow would be another way.”

After 40 years helping students and staff in a wide variety of positions, Gladstone has decided to retire, partly to avoid gaining the title of “crabbiest grandpa in the school.”

In his retirement, he plans to continue exploring metal sculpture and mixed media painting, hopefully creating pieces that “people think are cool enough to buy.”

Sharing the mentality he held during his career, Gladstone said, “If I get one [takeaway] a day I figure the day’s a victory. [...] As I walk into my office every time, I try to just think of that one takeaway before I close the door, so that way when I’m walking out of the office, I’m happy. I know I’ve gotten better today because of what’s happened, and I’m going to be even better tomorrow.”

Gladstone has inspired numerous staff members and students to have “better tomorrows.” He leaves Clayton after ten years to explore his own.

GL A DS TONE

34

christina vodicka Christina Vodicka, Head of the Art Department at Clayton High School, thinks of her (former) close colleagues among the CHS staff as mentors or friends.

“When I first came here, the art teacher who hired me was Charles Pierson. He mentored me quite a bit in my first, first years of teaching,” Vodicka said. “I also developed a close friendship with a woman named Kate Dolan who taught in the district. She was in Captain and then here at the high school for a long time and we worked together really well and sort of talked a lot of ideas and that kind of thing.”

Vodicka’s relationships with her colleagues weren’t the only positive relationships she made at CHS. Over her many years of teaching, she’s been able to gather many experiences with her students.

“The moments that accumulate for me, I think, are the ones where I know that students have kind of aha moments in class,” said Vodicka.

In classes where the students weren’t the most interested in taking art, Vodicka has discovered that she finds the sudden interests of the students to be memorable.

Vodicka’s interest in art wasn’t quite the same experience though. With an art teacher for a mom and a journalist for a dad, she had known from a very early age that she was interested in creative pursuits.

“I had an opportunity while I was still in college,” Vodicka said. “I was pursuing a

35

studio degree. I knew I wanted to study art; I wasn’t sure about teaching and I had a chance to do a summer workshop with elementary age kids at that time--I just loved it.”

This college experience influenced Vodicka’s decision to add a teaching certificate to her degree and become a teacher. Despite the fact that her experience in college was with a younger age range, as soon as Vodicka graduated college, she was hired for her current job and hasn’t moved to different grade levels or school districts.

“I’ve always taught here and then my experience with other age groups and other kinds of programs has always happened in the summer,” said Vodicka.

Vodicka is thinking of teaching again in similar programs, like COCA and Craft Alliance, with younger kids in the future, although she doesn’t have any definite plans for after her retirement from CHS. “I hope to get back to my own artwork, get my studio up and running again,” Vodicka said. “I always have something that I’m doing or some project that I’m working on, something that I want to get into.”

Vodicka has decided that she’ll take some time to do nothing and settle into her new life and routines before she thinks about what comes next.

“So I don’t have anything definite planned, I just know that I’ll make things happen for myself.”

“I’m proud of every time I was able to help a student see something profound,” said David Schuster, reflecting on his time at CHS. But back when he himself was a student, Schuster didn’t plan on going into teaching.

“When I was in school I just kind of put my head down and did school,” explained the beloved physics teacher who will be leaving CHS this year. “And then I got a PhD and I was like, ‘oh shoot, I can’t really do school anymore.’”

In one of many events of his career that he describes as “happenstance,” Schuster found out during the year he was finishing his PhD that his former physics teacher at Webster Groves High School was retiring. He went on to fill that position and teach physics for ten years at Webster.

“The early career was intense,” he said.

“High, extreme joy in being really good at teaching a thing from time to time, and then frustration, disappointment at all the various things that can be frustrating and disappointing, and then overlaid by a blanket of exhaustion.”

He stayed at Webster until 2017, when legendary CHS physics teacher Rex Rice retired and Clayton turned to Schuster to succeed him.

“They called me,” he sighed, laughing.

After what must have been a convincing phone call, Schuster once again stepped into formidable shoes to fill, replacing Rice as the teacher of Honors Freshman Physics and AP Physics I and II. In his four years in the district, “Doc” has built a reputation as one of the toughest and yet most passionate and inspiring CHS teachers.

“A purposeful struggle is the most productive struggle, because a student feels like she’s building something in the struggle, and then the struggle actually is better at building things,” he said, explaining how he sees his high school self reflected in the “lazy smart kids” he encounters in need of a challenge.

However, amid the challenges of the 20202021 school year, Schuster made the decision to step down from his position at the district.

“All the things about teaching that I love are missing this year, or are decreased this year. There doesn’t seem to be a proportional change to the things that I don’t like about teaching,” he said, explaining that the shortened instruction time and lack of lab periods this year have prevented him from covering sufficient content and delving deeply into what he teaches As Schuster pointed out, “Teaching is an intense profession. Your teachers feel a lot.”

He emphasized how hard this year has been for teachers, on top of the normal stressful nature of their jobs.

“I want to convey the deepest respect for my colleagues who have gone through the struggle,” he said. “They’re amazing. It’s been really, really hard.”

david schuster

REMEMBERING THE AIDS EPIDEMIC Forty years ago the AIDS epidemic ravaged gay communities across the United States, including St. Louis. The Globe shares the stories of a few who survived the epidemic.

O

ne night in 1985, a group of twelve sat down at a table to discuss starting St. Louis’s first AIDS relief organization.

They were joined by a small, unassuming nun, Sister Regina, who encouraged them to register their nonprofit organization and give it a name. She also chose their first president and Vice President, John Camp and Daniel Flier. She then disappeared, never to be seen at a meeting of the St. Louis Effort for AIDS again.

In the early 1980s, a mysterious illness began to sweep gay communities in San Fransisco, New York and Miami. Young, otherwise healthy gay men were stricken with unusual infections, similar to those that effected older people, or those with compromised immune systems. The cause of this turned out to be a virus, one that likely originated in 1920, in the Democratic Republic of Congo. This virus is known as HIV, or human immunodeficiency virus, and its final stage is known as AIDS or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome.

HIV is spread through infected blood, typically through shared needles, blood transfusions, or sexual contact. It weakens the immune system by attacking T cells, using their infrastructure to produce more viruses, and then destroying the cells. It first came to the attention of the CDC in 1981, being known as GRID or gay-related immune deficiency. By 1982 the name HIV/AIDS was first used to address this new virus.

A diagnosis of AIDS was essentially a death sentence until the development of medicines such as HAART drugs in the early 1990s.

As time went on, better treatments were discovered and now, life expectancy for those with HIV is nearly identical to that of the general population. Though this definitely was not the case in the early days of the pandemic.

Former Clayton resident Chuck Stiller had a small boxer named Lucy, as well as an extensive art collection at the time of his death of AIDSrelated complications in May 1995. His kind heart and intelligence were greatly missed by his family and the gay community of Miami.

Chuck had a relatively typical childhood as the third of four children, born to a public school teacher and a nuclear engineer in Paducah, Kentucky. “He was always just my little brother, we fought but we always loved each other, “ said Chuck’s sister, Marla Cohen.

Chuck was highly intellectual, participating in a variety of clubs and academic endeavors throughout his high school and college years. He received a degree in architecture from Princeton University, and then a law degree from Washington University. It was at Princeton that he met his first wife, Ellen.

“Well, after a few years, that marriage fell

FEATURE 36

apart for obvious reasons, probably because Chuck realized he wanted to live as a gay man,” said Chuck’s brother, Bill Stiller.

It was around this time that Chuck came out to his parents and siblings. “I sort of suspected before but it didn’t matter. He was my brother.

But we never had an open discussion about it until he came out to our parents,” Stiller said. “It was shocking to them maybe, but not surprising. They eventually accepted it.”

Chuck then moved to Miami, where he was able to live in a supportive community. He also became a general counsel, doing corporate transactions for large transportation companies.

But his life wasn’t all work and no play. “There was a very active social atmosphere in that community. Despite having a professional, serious job, Chuck also participated in that scene,” said Stiller.

It was also during this time that Chuck met his partner, Craig. The two had a very close and loving relationship, and Craig remained at Chuck’s side until the end of his life.

“He was very active in the community. He was active in gay community matters and children’s welfare organizations. He did a lot of fundraising,” said Stiller.

Sometime around 1984, Chuck was diagnosed with HIV. He continued to work as a lawyer and participate in community affairs until he decided to move to Europe. He traveled to Spain, England, and France with Craig and their dog, Lucy.

For the last few months of his life, Chuck was cared for primarily by his mother, Thelma, and his sister, Marla. “He was always very good to me. And I felt very good about our relationship at the end because I spent a lot of time with him,” said Cohen.

“I missed him greatly. And he was a great loss to so many people. Brilliant. Cultured. A renaissance man,” said Stiller.

The process of watching a loved one die from any illness can be excruciating. Especially if that illness is incurable, and includes a slow decline. “The reality of the process of dying was very difficult for me. In the end, it is just slow and agonizing for the individual and painful to watch,” said Stiller.

Chuck died in May of 1995, just months before the rollout of treatments such as HAART medicines to suppress HIV that could have saved his life.

Daniel Flier was born the youngest of six children in South St. Louis County. He attended Mehlville High school, which at the time was overwhelmingly white and Catholic. Despite this, his coming out process was relatively smooth. “There was never any horrible coming out stories. I just kind of was myself and everyone accepted and I was very fortunate in that respect,” said Flier.

Daniel graduated from high school in

1975. He attended beauty college and ended up working in housekeeping at a hospital.

He worked his way up to be a supervisor but eventually soured on the job. The day he quit his job, Daniel was sitting at a bar. The manager came by, lamenting that his bartender had quit, and asked Daniel if he had any experience in the industry. Despite the fact that he had no experience as a bartender, Daniel accepted the job. “And that was where I discovered the world of female impersonation. When I worked at that bar,” said Flier.

In 1981, Daniel won Miss Gay Illinois and Miss Gay Missouri in 1982. “I always knew that I wanted to do something with it, more than just compete and win contests. And then along came the AIDS epidemic,” said Flier.

The HIV epidemic came to St. Louis later than many epicenters like San Francisco and New York. Eddie was one of Daniel’s regular customers. One day he gets a call from Eddie’s sister telling him that Eddie is very sick but wants to get a haircut. Daniel agrees to this and makes sure it is just him and Eddie in the store.

“So they came and gave me gloves and a mask,” Daniel said while recounting the story. “And so, during his haircut. He said to me, I want to ask a favor and I said yeah. He said, You have such a gift of getting people to listen to you. And I said yeah. He said, you have to do something.

And I said, Eddie what do you want me to do and he said, warn people. So, he died two days later, ”Flier said. This encounter empowered Daniel to start spreading awareness about the AIDS virus.

The first meeting of the St. Louis Effort for AIDS (EFA) was in a St. Louis gay bar owned

by John Camp. The group of twelve came together to discuss how they could help those afflicted with what was known at the time as GIRD. With the help of an unassuming nun, they discussed their name, non-profit status, and methods of fundraising.

Their main method of fundraising was through drag shows. “Education was pertinent.

So I was known as the safe sex queen,” Flier said. “I would actually take condoms and open them and say, ‘This is a condom boys and girls, and this can save your life.’ “ One of the main functions of the organization in its early days was to ensure that people died with dignity. People did not yet understand how HIV was transmitted, and many, including medical professionals, were afraid to be with and care for those infected. people often assumed that you could get it through touch, mucus or even just breathing the same air as them. Many AIDS victims died alone due to this hysteria. The EFA realizing this, created a buddy system, to ensure that no one was alone in their last days.

“So I would go around along with a few other people, and visit people in the hospital who

were dying. Because that’s what happened in the early stages in this, there was no cure, no medicine in the very beginning. And we’d go see these people who I didn’t know and I would say, we’re here to talk to you. I’m here to help you,” said Flier.

Several other organizations branched off of EFA. These included Food Outreach, to provide food for those living with HIV. PAWS or Pets Are Wonderful Support, helped find homes for pets whose owners were no longer able to care for them or find companions for those who were sick. Doorways helped those with HIV find secure and stable housing.

Daniel’s career as a hairdresser has and continues to help him fundraise and raise awareness for the cause. You can often find him with a small jar on his counter, to collect money for the AIDS Walk. He also used his skills to help ease the suffering of those who were very sick, by cutting their hair and helping to groom them, often in their own homes. After several years, Daniel stepped down from the board of EFA. The epidemic took a great toll on the gay community in St. Louis. It also drastically changed the course of Daniel’s life. “It did change my life,” he said. “It kind of makes you reevaluate when you see, during a course of three years, I lost 34 friends, some of them very close, some, my best friend Val, and people who I was maybe not BFFs with, but pretty darn close to. I also learned what you can get back by giving, and not necessarily just money.” Flier said.

Daniel met his partner Drew in 2005, at a church through mutual friends. Daniel continues to work as a hairdresser and lives happily with Drew and their Yorkie Pomeranian, Spencer.

While the community was starting to fight against this new virus little government action was taken. Ronald Reagan was president in 1981 when the CDC first identified the mysterious illness infecting young gay men that was later discovered to be HIV. He also cut budgets at the CDC and the NIH. These budget cuts worked against the LGBTQ community who were already struggling to begin with.

“But the President that we had at the beginning of the epidemic, basically, you know, said, It’s not important and it’s not that big of a deal. And that’s basically what they did with it until they realized it was that big of a deal.”

Flier said.

The death of actor Rock Hudson in 1985 turned public attention to the epidemic and helped to spur government action. As more celebrities came forward with their HIV diagnoses, community organizations such as ACT UP continued to push for government funding and action on the epidemic. Projects such as the AIDS quilt, which included squares made by the loved ones of those who died of AIDS, drew more public awareness and put pressure on the federal government.

These efforts finally came to fruition in 1987, when the U.S. government created AIDS Awareness month and America Responds to AIDS advertising campaign for television.

That same year, the invention of AZT drastically improved outcomes for persons

with HIV, but at a great financial cost. “A lot of insurance companies just simply canceled people, because the cost of the medicines was astronomical, which you would think would be illegal,” said Flier. One of the new missions of EFA became to help people afford and obtain these life-saving medications.

Over the last 30 or so years, things have continued to improve for those living with HIV. The invention of HAART treatments in 1996 helped save the lives of many more. The Affordable Care Act helped many more people obtain insurance. But the fight against HIV is not yet over and bears many lessons for the COVID pandemic.

Government ignorance and inaction are a common thread between the two pandemics.

“And it was a little too late for both the AIDS and COVID. COVID and AIDS pandemics are pretty similar,” Flier said.

However, one main difference between the pandemics is the segments of the population that they affect. The COVID pandemic, due mostly to the virus’s airborne nature, has infected all segments of the population, though not all evenly. Even in 2018, 69 percent of new HIV diagnoses were in gay and bisexual men.

“In the beginning, it was a bunch of gay people dying, who cares? It was pretty obvious that was their response. People only started to

care when it began to infect other segments of the population,” said Flier.

The HIV epidemic was and still is a tragedy in many ways. Many people died before the government even began to take notice.

Countless lives were interrupted with death and illness. The entire epidemic is rarely discussed in school, whether that be sex education or even history classes. While we don’t see mass hysteria like in the early 80s, we still see remnants of this virus.

The American Red Cross until 2020 required gay men to endure 12 months of abstinence to donate blood. In 2021 3 months of abstinence is required to donate. What went from being a tragic virus targeting gay men has become another tool for discrimination.

Where the government failed, a community of amazing people came together. Many LGBTQ people and allies did whatever they could to not only spread awareness but spread love to people who needed it most. While the AIDS virus was a great tragedy it showed just how far a community could go to help the people around them.

alex cohen and sam smith

REPORTERS FEATURE 37

WOPO BROS’ LAST THROW Water polo seniors Sammy Fehr and Pablo Buitrago guide the team to an impressive winning record this season.

T

o seniors Pablo Buitrago and Sammy Fehr, water polo is unlike any other sport at CHS. Its required work rate and ability to bring players together greatly contributes to their love for the game.

For Fehr, water polo was a sport enjoyed by family members before him, including his older brother who eventually forced Fehr to participate as well. While Fehr wasn’t initially interested in the sport, he eventually grew to love it throughout his four years at CHS. Buitrago, as a freshman wanting to play soccer for CHS, wanted to play a spring sport to stay in shape for the fall soccer season.

“I decided to do water polo because I felt it was more similar to soccer than other sports.

It made me a much more physical player in soccer too,” Buitrago said. “[Water polo] taught me the value of personal training as far as going in and working out really consistently to make sure you’re physically better rather than just watching a game.”

Water polo, as a demanding sport both physically and mentally, and requires serious effort in and out of the water. As a freshman who didn’t receive a lot of playing time, Buitrago made it his goal to get in the water more in years to come.

Buitrago said, “Sophomore season I started going to the pool in the off-season to train because my freshman season was rough. I learned all these things about working hard outside the season so the winter between my freshman and sophomore seasons of water polo, I would go and swim every day, seven days a week.”

In addition to having physical strength, Fehr and Buitrago were required to have a serious amount of mental strength to maintain composure during tough and physical games.

In these tough games, fouling becomes a major part of the game and can often be difficult to deal with.

“Cheating is a pretty big part of water polo,”

SPORTS 38

Fehr said. “Because the refs don’t know what goes on underwater.”

“There are a lot of things that are considered foul,” Buitrago said. “The thing is, if the ref doesn’t see it, it’s not a foul. So basically the rule of thumb is if it’s underwater, it’s fair game.

Even though, in the real rulebook, it’s not a fair game.”

Both players have experienced moments of intense physical strain at the hands of other players. Fehr, in particular, had an experience this year that could have been detrimental.

“I was going up against somebody who was like 250 pounds,” Fehr said. “And I’ve never played field before, so I didn’t really know how to get fouls called and the refs weren’t paying attention as I was getting held underwater for almost ten seconds. He hit my neck and my nose. It was really unfair.”

Experiences like Fehr’s don’t happen frequently because of how dangerous they are, but even when they do happen, both players stressed the importance of staying calm and relaxed.

Though water polo has its intense moments, Fehr and Buitrago both expressed fondness in how simple the game can be at times. Because most people don’t practice water polo before

“

IN WATER POLO, EVERYBODY HAS ABOUT THE SAME AMOUNT OF EXPERIENCE WHICH MAKES IT A PRETTY LEVEL PLAYING FIELD. AND IT’S A JUDGE OF WHO WORKS THE HARDEST AND WHO PUTS THE MOST TIME INTO IT.

SOPHIE MATISZIK, MAYA RICHTER, AND LILY KLEINHENZ, PHOTOGRAPHERS

entering high school, the game is adapted for most students to be able to easily understand and play.

“That’s actually something I like about water polo,” Fehr said. “In other sports you might feel like you’re behind everybody if you haven’t been playing for like eight years when others have. But in water polo, everybody has about the same amount of experience which makes it a pretty level playing field. And it’s a judge of who works the hardest and who puts the most time into it instead of just who’s more skilled.”

With a relatively inexperienced team this year, Fehr and Buitrago have had to find other ways to boost the team’s success, including team bonding.

“We have Chipotle Tuesday,” Fehr said. “It’s a team tradition from even before we got there. It started like four years ago.”

Traditional Chipotle Tuesdays and limited numbers on the team have encouraged the players to become even closer with one another.

“

WE ALL CAME IN AND WORKED HARD...

WE’RE ACTUALLY DOING REALLY WELL THIS YEAR BECAUSE WE’RE ALL WORKING REALLY HARD. AND IT’S NOT THAT WE’RE THE BEST PLAYERS OR THE STRONGEST TEAM, IT’S JUST HARD WORK.

Fehr said, “[Water polo] is very different from other sports in my experience. It’s very tight-knit. Everybody’s on a similar skill level because they all have similar amounts of experience, so there’s less of a hierarchy of really good players and not-so-good players.

Everybody’s just friends and that’s really nice.”

The team this year only consisted of eighteen players, many of which were freshman with little to no experience. However, with a tightknit and devoted team, they were able to maintain a solid winning record.

“We all came in and we worked hard and we were trying to learn the positions,” Fehr said.

“And we’re actually doing really well this year because we’re all working really hard. And it’s not that we’re the best players or the strongest team, it’s just hard work.”

kaia mills-lee & cece cohen

SPORTS SECTION EDITORS

Pablo Buitrago looks to pass the ball to a teammate in an intense match against Parkway North

SOPHIE MATISZIK, PHOTOGRAPHER

SPORTS 39

SPRING SPOR TS RECAP GIR L S L A CR OS S E Standout Players: Paige Rawitscher, Sarah Centeno, Charlie McDonough

4-7 Favorite Memory:

Photo by Lily Klienhenz

Playing close games

End of the Season: Focusing and working hard

Next Season:

W AT E R P O L O

Continuing to develop as a team

Standout Players:

Blair McCoy, Peter Beardslee, Daniel Love, Sammy Fehr

4-4

Favorite Memory: Winning lots of games

End of the Season: To do well in conference

Next Season: Photo by Lily Kleinhenz

SPORTS 40

To keep winning games

GIR L S S OC CE R Standout Players: Lauren Hill, Kaia Mills-Lee, Paige Boeger

8-7 Favorite Memory: Playing in the snow

End of the Season: To Win Districts

Photos by Amy Ma

B OYS GOLF Standout Players: Eitan Fredman, Alex Gellman, Bennett Reeves

5-4 Favorite Memory: Practicing together as a team

Next Season: Better team chemistry

GIR L S T R A CK Standout Players: Sophia Peligreen, Izzy Erdmann, Sophie Thompson

Favorite Memory: Hanging out with the other distance girls in practice

End of the Season:

End of the Season:

To have players go to state

Doing well in relays

Next Season: To continue to improve as a team

B A S E B A LL Standout Players: Ned Thompson, Michael Filarski, Adam Jaffe

8-13 Favorite Memory: Beating Ladue

End of the season:

Next Season:

B OYS TR ACK Standout Players: Anand Mysorekar, Milan Patel, Shane LaGesse

Favorite Memory: Lutheran North meet

End of the Season: Doing well at districts

Next Season: Setting lots of personal bests

To continue to perform well

S OF T B A LL Standout Players: Olivia Zindel

1-3 Favorite Memory: Winning senior night

Next Season: Finding more players

To win Districts

Next Season: Developing younger players

Alex Cohen

Reporter

SPORTS 41

COMET COFFEE The Globe reviews an STL-based coffee shop also known for pastries.

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ith every cup of coffee and every shot of espresso, we take the utmost care and pride in what we do.” Comet Coffee is a quaint hand-brewed coffee and pastry shop. They are located near Forest Park on Oakland Avenue. The shop was opened by owner Mark Attwood and pastry chef Stephine Fischer in 2012. As a multi-roaster shop, they offer a large selection of different coffees from Ethiopia to Columbia and beyond. For the non-coffee drinkers, their freshly brewed teas are delightful. Part of the reason Attwood opened this shop was to follow his passion along with his partner Fischer. Fischer took on the micro-bakery part of their business by creating beautiful and delicious pastries. These high-quality pastries use ingredients coming mainly from local farms. Comet Coffee’s philosophy is that a cafe should be more than just a place to get caffeine. They say “it’s an experience of camaraderie, collaboration, and education.” The cafe promises an unforgettable experience.

Many may wonder how the name Comet ended up as a coffee shop. The name itself comes from Saint Louis history. Located right on Oakland used to be an amusement park named the Highlands. This park was built across from Forest Park, where the community college stands now. Opened in 1896, the amusement park lasted for decades before it was destroyed by a fire in 1963. During its prime, the park was most famous for its roller coaster the Comet. This ride, the coffee shop’s namesake, was one of the largest roller coasters of its time.

Due to the pandemic, Comet Coffee offers only outdoor seating and takeout. We were instructed to order through their website which, although it gave us a bit of trouble at first, was very quick. We were delightfully surprised to have our food and drinks ready fifteen minutes after we submitted our order.

On our lovely visit to Comet Coffee, we tried a variety of drinks. We ordered an iced caramel-flavored latte with oat milk ($0.75).

Other milk options included whole milk, low-fat milk, soy milk ($0.50), almond milk ($0.75), and breve milk ($1). This 12oz latte was delicious. The milk and caramel melted together to form a creamy and smooth flavor and the added ice perfectly complimented it, making it perfect for a hot St. Louis day.

top: cookie from Comet Coffee, bottom: drinks ordered from Comet Coffee

DHEERA RATHIKINDI, PHOTOGRAPHER

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Matcha latte, flat white with vanilla syrup, iced caramel-flavored latte with oat milk (left to right)

DHEERA RATHIKINDI, PHOTOGRAPHER Although the flavor of the latte was perfect, the price was not, as it was a bit expensive ($6). However, for an occasional treat, the large portion made the price worth it. (7/10).

We also purchased a flat white with vanilla syrup ($4.75). As a self-proclaimed espresso connoisseur, it was very obvious that the espresso in this drink was high quality. The smooth texture of the drink paired with the quality espresso made it one of the best flat whites we have had (10/10). We believe this drink would be perfect for those who are just beginning to wade into the world of coffee.

These two drinks make it clear that Comet Coffee pays a great deal of attention to their coffee and espresso quality. For a refreshing change of pace, we tried the matcha latte, which was incredibly smooth, creamy and refreshing ($4.50). Unlike the powdery texture of lowquality matcha, the high-quality ingredients used in this latte made for a delicious slightly sweetened treat. (8.5/10) The pastries at Comet Coffee were incredibly fresh. We ordered the blueberry muffin ($3) and their suggested side of passionfruit curd ($0.75). Together, the curd

and muffin were a very delicious duo. The buttery crumble of the muffin topped with the smooth texture of the curd made for a very pleasing bite. (8.5/10). However, individually the curd and muffin were not our favorites as the buttery crumble from the muffin overpowered the sweetness throughout the rest of the pastry and the curd alone possessed a very sweet flavor. We recommend purchasing them together. We also tried a pan au chocolat ($3.50), which was composed of thin buttery layers and a creamy chocolate center. As someone who has experienced pan au chocolat in Paris, eating this perfected pastry teleported me back to those streets. (10/10) We also ordered the chocolate strawberry chunk cookie ($2.50). This cookie is perfectly balanced; with the sea salt sprinkle highlighting the chocolate and strawberry flavors and the crispy outside edge blended with a soft center. We’d definitely recommend purchasing this cookie, especially as a late afternoon treat (9/10).

One of the highlights of Comet Coffee is the amazing customer service we received.

After ordering online, our order was ready very quickly. The staff accidentally forgot to include

our chocolate strawberry chunk cookie, but handled the mistake very well. We received a call and voicemail from them asking us to return and pick up the cookie or get a refund.

When we returned to pick it up, they kindly gave us an extra cookie for free and apologized profusely. The service we received was incredibly kind and considerate, making Comet Coffee the perfect friendly cafe.

Comet Coffee’s goal to create a unique and unforgettable experience was achieved during our visit. Our creamy drinks and buttery pastries were highly enjoyable and we loved the variety of optional additions. Although the prices were a bit steep, the products we received made the cost worth it. Consider checking it out if you are near Forest Park and want a lovely treat.

maya goldwasser, moriah lotsoff, and dheera rathikindi

REPORTER, REVIEW SECTION EDITOR, PAGE EDITOR

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MOXIE MOVIE REVIEW

Netflix released a new movie “Moxie” in March that details the struggles of teenage girls at a high school filled with sexism.

Moxie’s movie poster depicts the characters screaming, in response to their school’s sexism.

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ecently, Netflix released “Moxie,” a movie centered around female rights and explicit sexism at a public high school. Directed by Amy Poehler and starring Hadley Robinson, the movie received a 70% on Rotten Tomatoes.

Yearly at the high school, girls are ranked on the infamous “list.” This list is full of categories like “Best Rack” and “Most Bangable,” created by only the most socially elite boys at the school. Obviously, the movie left no room for interpretation; it wanted the audience to know that explicit sexism is still very much alive and deeply affects young women all over the world.

The main character, Vivian, anonymously creates “Moxie” flyers filled with feminist pictures and quotes which she puts in every school bathroom. Soon her small movement gains momentum and the school’s student body starts to fight back against the sexist dress code and tries to de-throne Mitchell Wilson, the “king” of their high school, from the title of “Best Athlete.”

Amidst all of the chaos, a love interest emerges between Vivian and a boy at her school, Seth. He becomes an ally of the “Moxie” movement and even tries to publicly promote its message as a man. Eventually the two start dating and she confides in him about her identity as “Moxie.”

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“MOXIE” OFFICIAL MOVIE POSTER Suddenly a very serious sexual assault allegation is made against Mitchell Wilson by another girl at the school. This element is the last straw for the rest of the “Moxies” at the school, leading to a walk-out and subsequent protest on school grounds.

As a result, the high school’s principal is shown calling Mitchell Wilson into her office, and the rest of the “Moxie” group continues to uplift and support the victims of harassment and assault who speak at the walk-out.

While the story has strong elements, such as the powerful friendships created in the “Moxie” movement, I personally think the movie was a little too exaggerated and full of plot holes.

While I love the message of the movie, young teenage girls fighting against a systematically sexist system, at times I felt the storyline was unbelievable. Everything seemed a bit too perfect to be true, such as the absence of backlash against the “Moxie” movement that is so common among widespread attempts at social change. At one point in the movie, the principal suspends one of the suspected “Moxie” girls, but no one else is caught and she is pictured protesting with the rest of the school at the end of the movie. Although there should not be any real consequences for students fighting for equal rights, the movie showed no sign of struggle or difficulty in achieving what

they did.

The biggest issue I had with the movie was the silencing of the rape allegation. This action was equated with being dress-coded at school, or receiving a comment about one’s appearance.

While no action involving stereotyping or misogyny should be validated, choosing not to focus on the trauma that accompanies rape was very disturbing to me as a viewer.

“There is one major flaw, the reveal of a date rape that was put on the same level as insulting someone’s hair, seriously undermining this issue,” said Stephanie Love, a public “Moxie” reviewer.

Also, the movie did not do a great job of showing what specific actions should be perceived as sexist. Instead of applying the sexism from their school’s “list” to real-world experiences, the message against misogyny was left at a school level–failing to create a bigpicture significance in terms of its damaging after-effects.

I think this movie did a fine job introducing to young audiences the importance of fighting against sexism in society, but it only scratched the surface on the struggles women and men endure in terms of sexual harassment and assault.

sasha keller PAGE EDITOR

PRO: VACCINE REQUIREMENT A vaccine requirement could allow those who feel unsafe to return to school and bring an end to the pandemic.

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OVID-19 has ravaged the world for over a year now, and finally there is a vaccine to help. There are currently three vaccines available, and anyone 16 and older is able to get one. This raises the question, should students and faculty be required to be vaccinated before returning for the next school year?

At the time of writing, Pfizer is the only vaccine eligible for people under 18. The company is additionally seeking approval from the FDA for administering their vaccine to 12-15 years olds. Pfizer stated that they hope that the approval will come before the start of the next school year. Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s leading infectious disease expert, told lawmakers that the government could begin vaccinating older children in the fall for the fall term. If this goes through, it would allow for most middle school students as well as all high school students to be vaccinated.

The benefits of getting vaccinated are numerous. It would not only allow for us to return to a more normal life, but also start to see friends and family once more, and bring an end to the pandemic. However, there are people who are unable to receive the vaccine due to either health or religious reasons. Due to this, all those who are physically able to should be required to be vaccinated before returning to school. It should also be noted that the Clayton School District requires their students to be vaccinated for diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis, meningococcal, polio, measles, mumps, rubella, hepatitis B and varicella. Students and parents are expected to provide documents with proof of these vaccinations as well as the day, month, and year of the vaccination. The COVID-19 vaccination could simply be another vaccination on the list.

People who are unable to get vaccinated will be at a higher risk of contracting COVID-19 the more people there are unvaccinated. A higher percentage of vaccinated individuals would lead to herd immunity, when a large percentage of a community becomes immune to a virus, making the spread of this virus much more difficult. To reach herd immunity, experts have calculated that at least 80% of the population needs to be vaccinated. This lowers the chances of infection and protects the whole community and not just those who have immunity.

If everyone who is able to get vaccinated does, then the school district will be able to create herd immunity within its schools. This would allow for those who are unable to get vaccinated for due reasons to return to school without having to worry about catching the virus. However, the school should carefully

A CHS student recieves a COVID-19 vaccine at the clinic provided by the School District of Clayton.

LILY KLEINHENZ, PHOTOGRAPHER consider those who are exempt from receiving the vaccination, as there are some who would abuse these conditions.

There is also no scientifically supported reason for those who are able to not receive the vaccine. Conspiracy theories such as microchipping and tracking coupled with

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GETTING VACCINATED WOULD NOT ONLY SIGNIFICANTLY LOWER ONE’S OWN RISK OF COVID-19, BUT IT ALSO ALLOWS FOR OTHER MEMBERS OF THE COMMUNITY TO FEEL AND STAY SAFE.

misinformation and general distrust of the government and the vaccine has led to a large number of adults who are refusing to receive the vaccine.

Although most Americans hope to get vaccinated, several have decided they will not get the vaccine. Several polls conducted around the nation have found that 1 in 4 Americans plan to remain unvaccinated. This concerns health officials, as the time it takes to reach herd immunity is increasing. The cause of this worry is that the more time it takes to reach herd immunity, the more time is given for new strains to develop.

Getting vaccinated would not only significantly lower one’s own risk of COVID-19, but it would allow for other members of the community to feel and stay safe. Not getting the vaccine for reasons other than health and religion puts an avoidable number of people at risk. If possible, everyone should get vaccinated.

For this reason, everyone who is able to receive the vaccine should be required to be vaccinated before returning to school in the fall.

iris park

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CON: VACCINE REQUIREMENT A vaccine requirement for students would be a waste of precious resources that should be allocated for those who actually need them.

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ue to recent expansions in eligibility, it is now possible for all Missouri residents over the age of 16 to receive a COVID-19 vaccine.

This development has led some to wonder whether Missouri schools should require their students to receive a vaccine against the coronavirus. After all, similar vaccine mandates already exist–in Missouri, students must be vaccinated against polio, meningitis, and a number of other diseases. However, in the case of COVID-19, a school-wide vaccination requirement would be unwise.

The first problem with a school vaccination requirement is one of availability. Currently, no vaccines are authorized for use in children aged 15 and under, and although Pfizer has recently requested FDA authorization for the use of their vaccine in children over the age of 12, vaccine trials in younger children have only recently begun. As a result, it will most likely be several months until vaccines are authorized for all school-aged children. Were these vaccines to be authorized late in the summer, it would be difficult for all of the United States’ 35 million elementary and middle school students to be fully vaccinated before the beginning of school.

One also has to question the necessity of vaccinating children against COVID-19. While the disease has resulted in over three million

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AS COVID-19 IS NOT PARTICULARLY DANGEROUS TO SCHOOLCHILDREN, LIMITED VACCINE SUPPLIES SHOULD BE DIVERTED TO MORE VULNERABLE POPULATIONS. deaths worldwide, the vast majority of those deaths has been concentrated among those over the age of 50. As of April 21, in the United States there have been only 266 COVID-related deaths among children under the age of 17, and while it is possible for students to transmit the coronavirus to teachers and other school

staff (for whom the disease is more dangerous), in Missouri, COVID-19 vaccines have been available to educators since March, and to all adults since early April. As COVID-19 is not particularly dangerous to schoolchildren, limited vaccine supplies should be diverted to more vulnerable populations.

There is an element of personal responsibility associated with COVID vaccinations as well. Measles and chickenpox (for which Missouri schools require inoculation) have basic reproduction rates of 12-18 and 1012, respectively, indicating that each person infected with measles (for example) will transmit the disease to between 12 and 18 other people. For these illnesses, schools have a responsibility to mandate vaccinations, to ensure that teaching can continue and that students remain safe. However, for the coronavirus, most transmissions involving children occur outside of school–in a recent newsletter, the Clayton School District itself reported that “Along with many other school districts in the region, we have not seen transmissions occurring within a school setting.” In effect, schools have been successful in preventing the transmission of COVID-19 within their halls. If students and their families make unwise decisions outside of school that result in the spread of the disease, the responsibility for vaccination should fall on them, not on the school itself.

One argument made in favor of school COVID vaccination requirements concerns the spread of “variants” of the disease. In effect, if children remain unvaccinated, the coronavirus will spread among them and mutate. This would result in the occasional emergence of new variants of the disease which, although not particularly dangerous to children themselves, could prove resistant to the vaccinations previously given to adults. While it would be foolish to allow variants of COVID to emerge (requiring the development of new vaccines and booster shots), this argument assumes that American schoolchildren are the only source of new variants of the virus. This is untrue.

Already, COVID variants from Britain, Brazil, and South Africa have appeared in the United States. Worldwide, only 13 vaccine doses have been administered for every 100 people.

Surplus vaccines should therefore be delivered to other countries, preventing the emergence of new variants while also protecting populations at more risk from the disease than American school children.

luka bassnett PAGE EDITOR

TEACHER SABBATICALS The Globe dives deeper into sabbaticals and why teachers need them.

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ast week, CHS celebrated Teacher Appreciation Week with snacks, notes and sidewalk-chalk messages for faculty members. But despite the air of festivity, this school year has been undeniably taxing for educators.

After two draining and difficult semesters of navigating Zoom classes, schedule changes, hybrid learning, classroom sanitation and low motivation among students, record numbers of beloved teachers are retiring across the district.

A nationwide teacher shortage has left other public schools across the country flailing to fill teaching positions during the pandemic.

But teacher exhaustion and burnout hasn’t always been as normalized. Until 2007, there was one thing that set teaching at Clayton apart from teaching at Kirkwood, Ladue or Parkway.

Once Clayton teachers had taught in the district for six years, they were eligible to take a paid sabbatical that allowed them to develop their teaching interests and skills through travel, education or personal projects. As CHS art teacher Christina Vodicka explained,

teachers had the option of taking a semester-long sabbatical at full salary or a full-year sabbatical at half salary. But when Vodicka reached her seventh year of teaching at Clayton, the sabbatical program ended.

“It was frustrating because I had friends and colleagues who had taken sabbaticals and really got a lot out of it, having that time and being able to focus on different things,” she said. English teacher John Ryan shared the same experience.

“The year I was eligible to receive one (year 7 of teaching at CHS) was the year they took them away,” he said. “The prospect of a sabbatical had been a pretty strong incentive for me to build my career at Clayton; many of my older colleagues at the time had taken advantage of semesterand year-long sabbaticals to complete graduate education, write books, travel, and do other forms of research that gave them new energy and purpose, which they then fed back into their teaching in numerous ways. I was pretty disappointed, to say the least.”

Sabbaticals for teachers have far-reaching benefits, and not just for the teachers themselves. They help create a culture of university-level academic rigor where teachers are expected to pursue their crafts and educate themselves outside of the classroom. Teachers come back from sabbaticals more engaged and informed, better positioning them to empower and instruct their students on deeper levels.

“From a budget standpoint, it’s really tricky,” said Vodicka, acknowledging the difficulty of paying salaries to both teachers and long-term substitutes. “From a professional standpoint, I think it’s incredibly valuable. I do think that it would certainly affect retention, if teachers coming here or who are already here knew that that was a possibility, then that’s very appealing.”

The budgetary burden of providing sabbaticals to teachers is justified in comparison to the profound positive impact they could have on CHS’ educational environment and teacher experience.

But even aside from the potential benefits of bringing back sabbaticals, teachers simply deserve them. Being a teacher is incredibly hard work, and it’s hard work that is widely underpaid and undervalued in society despite the proven fact that teacher quality is the number one factor in determining student success.

“The national sentiment has shifted against teachers in the last ten or so years, and that’s inescapable,” said Ryan. He pointed out that teachers were celebrated at the beginning of the pandemic for adapting to learning at home, but were widely vilified for raising concerns about returning to in-person school in the fall.

Hiring and retention rates were dropping even before COVID-19, proving that this problem stems from inherent flaws in how teachers are treated in the American education system. According to the Economic Policy Institute, public school teachers are paid on average 20% less in weekly wages than college graduates in non-teaching jobs.

Until a national shift takes place in how American teachers are treated, teacher retention and teacher mental health will continue to remain low across the country. By strengthening support for teachers through sabbaticals, Clayton can be a part of that shift at the district level.

The School District of Clayton has long been known for respecting and valuing its teachers.

But without the incentive of a sabbatical at the end of six years and the lack of commitment to helping teachers grow outside of the classroom, Clayton has in part lost its effectiveness when it comes to retaining teachers. In order to attract candidates, hire passionate and qualified professionals and keep those teachers in the district even as COVID-19 continues to upend schooling as we know it, paid sabbaticals are the solution. Teachers form the backbone of any educational institution; it’s time we start treating them like it.

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Teacher Innovation Grants: $30,000 Awarded The Clayton Education Foundation recently awarded nearly $30,000 to educators all over the District to support innovative teaching materials and methods.

By providing innovative learning experiences that are not covered by tax dollars alone, we advance the School District of Clayton’s culture of academic excellence and help students reach their full potential.

The Clayton Education Foundation is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization; all gifts are tax deductible.

Learn more at www.claytoneducationfoundation.org