USA’s Darlene Rierson makes positive impact in the classroom

For 28 years, Darlene Rierson has been teaching various math subjects to students from Algebra II, to geometry, pre-calculus, statistics, SAT prep and calculus.

Fifteen of the 28 years were to students at Caro Schools. For the past 13 years, USA High School students have turned to her to teach them these subjects.

“I’ve always wanted to be a teacher,” Rierson said. “There’s never been a moment that hit me. I played ‘school’ when I was little. I was the teacher when I played with my sister and cousin. When I went to Central Michigan University, I went to school to be a teacher. Then, I looked at what content I was good at. I didn’t go into a content, I went to be a teacher first.”

Rierson said the USA school district is a team of teachers, and there’s no one teacher who stands out from the rest.

“We work very well together, and we are a strong team,” she said. “We aren’t afraid to challenge each other. We try to think outside the box and support each other. So, the fact that I’m the one nominated, is that I’m simply the one nominated.

Truly, I believe we have a team of teachers that work together to create a great system for our kids.”

“When you have a team you can trust, then you can do things that may be risky,” she added. “You know someone has your back. You can take a chance, and people will be willing to do something different, because people trust you. It’s a great environment to work in.”

A lesson that Rierson has learned from teaching is always to expect change. If you expect a lesson to go a certain way, it never will go exactly as planned.

“You have to be willing to change,” she said. “Students are still students. Kids are still kids. You’re there to work with them, and that means you have to change sometimes.”

“Your students push you,” she added. “If they’re not understanding the lesson you put forward to them, they’ll push you to adapt. You have to try harder. I try to work as hard as my students. That has carried on to other things in my life. When they work hard, I try to work just as hard as them.”

When Rierson is teaching, she is not only teaching the content and lessons for the day.

“I’m teaching the students to be hard workers, and if you don’t get the result you wanted the first time, you have to work harder the