Unbelievable!! What is the world coming to?? What a day......10:30 a.m., Friday, the entire Nevada High School staff, students and a few dignitaries were called to the gymnasium, 500-600 or so. The Superintendent was there to give a speech. Everyone noticed the television cameras and a newspaper reporter or two. There were balloons and large signs. Allied Insurance and WHO TV 13 in Des Moines were the sponsors. The Principal, Ray Murray introduced the Channel 13 newswoman. She said we were all here to honor a NHS faculty member........Silence filled the gymnasium......... Would a Mr.Tyrone come down?......Geeeze....Nightmare?....Bad dream??......did I miss something at the last faculty meeting?.....The place erupted, I was given the Golden Apple Award from Allied Insurance and WHO-TV. The students had submitted my name.....Geeze......Had to give a thank you speech....I was speechless.....I was given two very nice plaques. One is a Golden Apple for teaching excellence.....(they get the right guy?...anyone looked at my file recently??? My evaluations??? How did this get by the Administration?)....I can just hear my colleagues, "What? That idiot?. the guy that cranks up his music so loud?"...after my 3 sentence speech, the Principal came out and told the crowd that his biggest worry was that I would not come to the assembly. That has happened a few times in the past and he assigned the AD to make sure I made it. After the very short presentation, quite a few of the students came down and shook my hand....pretty tough...and all in front of the TV cameras.....after a few pictures, the camera crew went into my (messy) classroom and shot pictures of me teaching.....(geeze, I usually just turn on the VCR, this is Social Studies you know)......after 20-30 minutes of me explaining the development of societies and culture, (that will make great TV?) I sat down for a 20 minute interview....I am sure they will cut it down to 15 seconds....and I probably said some really stupid stuff...it was like a deer in the headlights, the Dan Quayle syndrome.....They are going to show this on WHO TV 13 Monday morning at 7:00 a.m. and again, either at noon or 6:00 pm, I forgot what they said. People kept popping in all day, teachers, friends and students, congratulating me. I was starting to wonder if this award was presented posthumously. It was pretty darn embarrassing. It was really super for the students to support this, but there are so many more deserving teachers, everywhere.....anywhere..... I am not even one of the best teachers in my hallway. I do have fun in class. I got a great way of doing Current Events, which I start out most days with. I have two great subjects to teach. American History, which to me is just a collection of stories. I love to read history anyway and then will put together a great story about Black Hawk Down or the Titanic or the JFK Assassination. I also teach Economics, where I use my eBay experience, stock simulations and old baseball card show stories to clarify the economic principles. I use lots of visuals (slide show stuff), music and competitions. (stock simulations etc.) I do have www.tryonuniversity.com., that I am really proud of and this year I now have a sign up for the Tryon University Newsletter. (which you are  welcome to do at www.tryonuniversity.com ) It is a monthly publication that I send out to keep in touch with the former students and current ones. Some parents have also subscribed and I run a couple of competitions off of it. Mainly, my classes are just kind of fun, taught by the school clown, or Village Idiot. (it takes a village you know) I can just imagine the rolling of the eyes that are going on in the other buildings and other places I have taught. Man, has education sunk this low? Anyway, what a day. Barb knew nothing about this until she got home from her new job at Principal. It was good for Nevada to get some positive publicity after the Homecoming mess last year and we have always had a lot of really great kids......You know, they could have created a monster with this, I have already asked the Principal if Award Winning Teachers need to attend staff development and our weekly meetings. This may say a lot for doing things the way you want to do them and not the way you are suppose to.....   Anyway, it was, quite a day.......the longest day.

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