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Two Years a Teacher: Memories

2025-06-11
by Olivier Cleynen

[last of a series: Two Years a Teacher]

[stu­dent names have been altered]

Mem­o­ries I take with me.

  • Finn, whom I thought of as a dif­fi­cult stu­dent in a real­ly tough class, on the last day of my first school year, pat­ting me on the back and say­ing “it was nice with you Mr. Cleynen”.
  • My next-door col­league Anna, upon learn­ing that a stu­dent had just told me I was the worst teacher they ever had, rush­ing to give me a hug and check on me.
  • After two and years of bring­ing con­flict in my class, Lev­ent start­ing to trust me, and on his own ini­tia­tive, giv­ing his best for my big physics test.
  • That one com­pli­ment packed in an adjec­tive in a pass­ing sen­tence by Yara.
  • Final­ly man­ag­ing, on my sec­ond try, to inte­grate Open Day into my nor­mal class sched­ule — and just stand­ing there beam­ing with pride at my stu­dents just rock­ing it in front of guests sit­ting at the back of the class.
  • My head teacher Nor­man, faced in a meet­ing with an avoid­able admin­is­tra­tive and orga­ni­za­tion­al has­sle that would ben­e­fit a stu­dent, just jump­ing into it with­out the slight­est hesitation.
  • Ami­ra, a tal­ent­ed, top-lev­el stu­dent, qui­et­ly giv­ing with­out end to sup­port stu­dents around her instead of work­ing to pro­tect her grades.
  • See­ing my vice-prin­ci­pal Antje craft a thought­ful, pos­i­tive, work ses­sion to sup­port her teach­ers, and walk­ing out of it feel­ing heightened.
  • David and Mila self­less­ly jump­ing in to my sides to help pro­tect the dig­ni­ty of their class­mate who had thrown up in class.
  • Find­ing a big “Glüh­wein” stick­er lying around in the teach­ers room, and stick­ing it onto the refrig­er­a­tor ice cube dis­penser (yes I thought it was very funny).
  • Aylin who com­plete­ly failed my big test because I caught her cheat­ing, hang­ing on, fight­ing and claw­ing her way back all year long after that.
  • Show­ing up in class in my wed­ding suit — and then rush­ing out to get mar­ried before my next class.
  • Liam, on his first day with me, full with pride while telling me that I had his big sis­ter Aley­na as a stu­dent in anoth­er class.
  • My math-and-Eng­lish teacher col­league choos­ing to be vul­ner­a­ble and authen­tic, yet remain­ing unwa­ver­ing­ly pro­fes­sion­al, in this small teacher work group. And then get­ting up, and going right back to root­ing for her stu­dents wait­ing on the oth­er side of the door.
  • My bas­ket­ball-play­ing 9th graders still a lit­tle high after scor­ing well in the sports cham­pi­onship the day prior.
  • Drop­ping a bunch of exper­i­men­tal glass­ware on the floor on a rough day, and see­ing 6th graders I did not even know just come and help me gath­er up the pieces instead of ignor­ing me.
  • After months of con­flict and mis­ery, this one group exper­i­ment ses­sion with this rough 7th grade class where they were so focused, so self-aware, that I found myself stand­ing there with noth­ing to do, afraid to add any­thing and break the magic.

These, among a hun­dred more gath­ered in these 30 months spent work­ing as a high school teacher, are a good place to end this series. Hard times and good times, climbs to the high­est highs, and omnipresent growth and poten­tial. Go expe­ri­ence that too — be a teacher.

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(more by Olivier: articles, thermodynamique, fluid mechanics, mécanique newtonienne)