Introduction

Hello, my name is Edward Stephen Paxson and I’m interning for Sean McKenzie at Hutchison High School during this school year. I’ll mostly be teaching World History to Sophomores. I like how my mentor does a lot of things and admire the  connections and influence he has on his students.

I’m 29 years old and moved to Fairbanks as soon as I turned 18. I grew up in Chicago. I first graduated UAF in 2010 with a technical degree and worked in that field for 6 years. I’m back at school, having completed a Bachelor’s in History, to complete my Bachelor’s in Secondary Education.

For the past year-and-a-half, I’ve worked part-time at the Literacy Council of Alaska teaching mostly Social Studies and Science to high school dropouts studying to get their GED. Much of my teaching there is as a literacy coach since the GED tests largely focus on content area through being able to understand its texts. An astonishing thirty-million American adults are out of high school without a high school diploma. Being a part of helping to bring down that number in our community has been a very rewarding experience and has given me a good foundation to start student teaching.

Managing a classroom can be a big challenge. If one is unable to do this well, it can become a significant detracting factor in job satisfaction. I look forward to becoming more comfortable with this necessary skill so I can succeed and have fun as a teacher.