By: Marisol Contreras
The new teacher on the block is Mr. Caldwell who was formerly known for being a Biochemist at UCR where he worked in a lab with one of his sincere professors and later down the road a great friend of his. He worked as a biochemist for almost 30 years and decided to take advice from his colleagues and become a teacher after his professor got terminal cancer. Mr. Caldwell became intrigued in teaching after one of his friends who was a high school teacher had invited him to do some demonstrations in his classroom; he also worked with youth groups at a local church and had done some demonstrations there as well. While doing those demonstrations, he learned some things about himself and other people that he hadn’t expected to learn. Although, with doing something new like the demonstrations, he described it as appearing to be “scary and eventually had a positive experience at the end.''
When it came to college, Mr. Caldwell was never a great student, but the material was easier for him to understand and get his work done. Academically, he was in a shared competitive medical program (known as The Thomas Haider Program) that was shared with UCLA and UCR; at the time it was split with two sides, one being the major he was in and the other was with the medical students. “The medical students competed to be in that program so it was a very big deal at the time. Since it was held to that standard the rigor for that program contained very high classes and was difficult, which included doing a lot of work, which was academically hard, but eventually I powered through it...” is how Caldwell had described one of his college experiences at the time. He did play an intramural sport which was flag football, with his colleagues from the lab he used to work at.
When Caldwell was asked about having any remarkable teachers in the past, he remembered from his high school, he responded by saying “that there are so many neat things about high school teachers” one of them being that “a lot of them have many definite personalities”. Along with doing things in a different manner in which he began to give an example which was about his experience with subbing and observing teachers in which they all do things differently and set up things in ways you didn’t think of. He believes that “you can learn a little bit from people who are different from you”. He then began to speak about one of his teachers that he found to be significant to him in which he began to say that he “had an English teacher who had a distinctive personality, who taught composition and talked and acted the same like Ernest Hemingway, and was my favorite because he always tried to develop relationships with students and worked with them. Along with trying to put on plays and would include me in some even though I couldn’t really act. He involved everybody and got to know the students. Which wasn’t common in high school classes and was more like college today”.
Mr. Caldwell had then received his teaching credentials at Brandman University. When he was asked about the best part about his job as a teacher, he said that “the best part is when students get excited about learning and when they finally understand a concept, as well as one on one teaching because we both get to learn from each other”. Along with being asked about how Eisenhower had treated him so far, in which he responded with “each school has a different feel to it, Eisenhower is similar to my daughter’s school in which it feels like home and the atmosphere, as well as the students being down to earth, is what makes it feel that way. I’ve been treated very well by the students, especially being a teacher, which is a hard job, it’s scary, especially the first year because you have a fear of not doing enough for students. Students had been very patient with me. I also receive help from other teachers who are very supportive and helpful.” A lot of students tend to give Caldwell feedback about how to improve his teaching and he appreciates it especially when their patient about it. He also mentioned how learning how to teach somebody is one of the greatest things about being a teacher.