By Jessica Wu
Staff Writer
Mira Costa High School is extremely fortunate to have such a dedicated staff. Among that dedicated staff, however, there are a few individual teachers who have officially been recognized by their co-workers.
The Annual Teacher of the Year Award recognizes teachers for their exceptional dedication. This year, the staff selected social studies teacher Bill Fauver for the award.
“I feel very humbled and honored. It’s nice to see that my peers and colleagues think that I’m doing a nice job as a teacher, but I feel like there are others who deserve this award more than I do.” Fauver said. “There are so many teachers here that do good things, and it feels like I’m stealing from them by being recognized,”
Fauver said he runs his class in a no-nonsense manner and tries to waste as little time as possible. His ultimate goal is for his students to leave class each day with some new improvement in a skill or increase in knowledge.
“Mr. Fauver is a great teacher, and he definitely deserves his victory as Teacher of the Year,” junior Allan Chong said.
Many students said that it was Fauver’s approach to education that made him a worthy recipient of the Teacher of the Year award
“Mr. Fauver is one of the best teachers I’ve ever had because he was really passionate about his subject. He really inspired me,” said senior Lyra Hall.
Students also said they felt that Fauver’s teaching style made them work harder.
“I’ll always remember his way of yelling at us, but it never seems bother his students. We always wanted to do our best to show what we were he capable of,” senior Russell Sperberg said.
In addition to teaching history at Costa for 23 years, Fauver is the junior varsity boys golf coach.
“My all time favorite Fauver moment was during golf practice. I was in the middle of a heated putting contest and he started asking me AP U.S. questions. He asked who replaced Churchill at the Yalta Conference and when I asked for the anwer, he drew a blank,”former Costa student Jimmy Burke said.
“After we left, I was sitting in my car waiting on a red light and he gets out of his car, steps up to my window and says ‘Clement Atlee’ and steps back. That sums up everything he is.”
Other faculty members have voiced their approval of Fauver’s recognition as Teacher of the Year, including fellow nominee Dr. Rocky Wilson.
“He is a perfect recipient of this award. When I heard that I was nominated along with him, I felt honored to be one of his contemporaries,” Wilson said.
Wilson, who was a runner-up, has been teaching since he got his first job at Felton Middle School in 1976 and has been at Costa for 22 years. Wilson is a math teacher and badminton coach.
“I like the everyday challenge to inspire young minds to discover and understand their world. The absolute best part is that I learn just as much from my students as they learn from me,” Wilson said.
English teacher Pam Jenning also was nominated in the competition. She has taught for 33 years, 18 at Costa.
“She’s what we like to call wickedly smart. She’s dedicated, supportive, and she’s good at making things make sense for students,” English teacher Deborah Hofreiter said.
Jenning teaches junior honors English, themes in American literature and film, and freshman English, and is the sponsor for the National Honors Society and co-chair of the English Department. She was also a key player in creating the school-wide ethics policy.
Any Costa teacher can be nominated for this honor by any faculty member. Then, all of the faculty members select a winner among the nominees through a voting process.
“It’s tough to choose a winner because all of the teachers are deserving of this award and wonderful in different ways, and they’re definitely all inspirations for their students,” Vice Principal Jennie Wright said.
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