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Science 2023-24
Hi! Welcome to my "teacher bio" page! I will not be using this website during the school year; instead, I'll use Canvas for updating students/parents and HAC for grading, but there are usually lots of hits on this page in August when, presumably, students/parents are trying to get the scoop on their new teachers, so here goes...
I've been teaching 9th grade science, chemistry, and physics at Neshaminy High School since the 2008/09 school year.Since I've been at the high school, I've taught Integrated Science, Foundations of Chemistry, "College Prep" Chemistry, Honors Chemistry, "College Prep" Physics, and Honors Physics.I like to think of myself as an understanding and reasonable guy, but I hope to expect a lot from my students (I aim for the tough, but fair kind of teacher).If you see my name on your schedule for Chemistry, I'm excited to be back after a one-year hiatus. Neither Foundations Chem or Chem I will be super math-heavy, but we'll do our fair share of it for sure. Chemistry will require less (but still some) memorization than Biology. If you hated Biology (like I did), that certainly doesn't mean you'll hate Chem (I hope!).If you see me for Physics I, welcome! In Physics I, you should expect a fairly math-heavy introduction to physics. We'll cover all the topics you'd see in a college-level physics I class and about half of the topics you'll see in physics II. It'll be a bunch of algebra, some fun labs, and a lot of numbers. I'll be the after-school physics helper in the library from 2:30 - 4:00 on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so help will be available.Aside from teaching, my wife, Rachael, and I have three pretty small boys. As I type this, our oldest, Sam is 6, our middleman, Rhett is 5, and our youngest, Ben, is 4. Aside from keeping up with the boys, I enjoy spending time with Rachael (as you'd hope, right?), traveling (although, that has super slowed down lately, haha), reading (currently reading book 2 from the Three Body Problem by Cixin Liu), watching movies/TV, listening to music (think 88.5 WXPN kinda stuff), and hanging with friends/family. If you ask Rach, I'm way too invested in sports (Dodgers, Packers, Celtics, and Flyers). I live in Churchville and, if you're reading this in August, there's a pretty good chance that I'm prepping for some fantasy football drafts at this very moment! I graduated from Neshaminy a looooong while back and I'm a Penn State (undergrad) and Temple (grad) alum. Also, my brother is a Guidance Counselor here! He's great!This past summer has been pretty low-key for us, I've spent most of my time just hanging with the family, we took a couple of pretty modest trips, and I tutored SAT Math at Y2 Academy over by H-Mart.