Sixth grade English teacher Michele Dugan has been teaching in the school district for a total of 36 years!
She graduated from Penn State University in 1989 and shortly after started being a substitute teacher. After some long term substitute jobs, she was hired in 1992. At the end of this school year, her teaching years will come to an end as she is going to be retiring.
Dugan said that she has been on a school schedule since she started school at the age of five. After she graduated high school, she went straight into college and after college, she started teaching. So she is definitely looking forward to not having to follow a school schedule. She actually already has a beach trip planned in September, so she can be at the beach, while everyone else has to go back to school.
But Dugan also also has parts of teaching and people that she will miss after retiring.
“I will miss the wonderful people that I’ve worked with. I have been blessed to be surrounded by amazing teachers. They have been wonderful people that were not just co-workers, they were friends and many of them were like family, and I’m going to miss seeing them and having my coffee and chatting with them in the mornings,” said Dugan.
Dugan says that once she retires she will still be the assistant director for the drama club at the high school, but that she would also like to read and travel more.
And as some last words of advice for other up and coming teachers or just others in general.
“If you see someone doing something that is really great, go ahead and steal that idea. You don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Every time I go to a different building, watch a different teacher teach, or go to a workshop, there is always something I can steal and bring back to my own classroom. So steal away,” Dugan said.
