Mr. Williams is without a doubt, one of the most expressive teachers you will ever have. Every day, he teaches his students a new story. Whether they’re studying about Reaganomics or the roaring 20’s, Mr. Williams always makes sure his lessons are engaging and fun. So, it seems only natural that he be the subject of a story!
We begin our story in the town of Provo, Utah, where Mr. Williams and his identical twin brother Jason, were born on September 19th, 1972. After living in Utah for around 1 year, Mr. Williams and his family moved to Marysville, Washington, which he has lived near ever since. When our teacher and his brother were younger, they would almost constantly get mistaken for one another. Even in their adult years, occasionally someone will walk up to Mr. Williams mistakenly thinking that he is his brother, although this happens less and less, as they have never lived in the same state during their adult lives. However, that doesn’t mean they are any less close. “We are very similar, besides just being identical. His opinions are always my opinions, and it’s nice to be constantly validated.”
From there, Mr. Williams went to the University of Washington, and eventually got a job at UPS. He worked for UPS for 14 years, in internal communications, which he described as “working in advertising, but specifically for employees of that company.” Although he liked his job fine, it involved long hours, which meant he never really got to see his children, and he traveled often, which cut down on his family time even more. He also “never particularly cared” about the ins and outs of mailing packages, and he wanted to do something he cared about – something that would make him feel like he accomplished something meaningful in life. So, from there he became a teacher!
Mr. Williams began his teaching career in Lynwood (Washington), where he taught part-time for one year. From there, he came to Granite Falls School District, and has never left. When asked why he moved to the high school, he revealed that “Mr. Dinwiddie called me up and said ‘would you like to teach here at the high school?’, and I said ‘sure, why not!’” That was about 10 years ago, and Mr. Williams has been here ever since.
Throughout his teaching career, Mr. Williams has taught many subjects, from history classes, to art classes, and even one year of intro to technology (which was “so boring, it was just dreadful to teach.”), but his absolute favorite to teach is AP US History. This is his favorite to teach because “AP allows us to go deeper and learn a little more.” He specifically likes to teach modern times (from WW2 to the present), because “…the closer we get to modern times, the more relevant it is to our day-to-day life.” He also loves teaching AP US History in particular, because it is mostly Juniors, and the Juniors are his favorite class, because “they know more than Sophomores, but aren’t as arrogant as Seniors.”
Although he loves to teach, Mr. Williams also loves to read. “I read every spare second of every day that I can.” He reads roughly 100 books per year, averaging 365 pages per book, which means he reads about 100 pages per day. He reads a lot of books about history, but he also enjoys readinglots of fantasy and science fiction books. Unfortunately, he doesn’t have any pets that keep him company while he reads, as he is allergic to cats, and his wife is allergic to dogs. His favorite season is Fall, because it’s his birthday, the school year starts again, the weather isn’t too hot, and Halloween is right around the corner. In fact, one of Mr. Williams’ favorite holidays is Halloween. “Christmas seems like an easy answer. But it’s probably true. Although I do like Halloween… probably those two. Probably because those are the holidays with the most sugar,” Mr. Williams shared with a laugh.
Lastly, I was most curious about how Mr. Williams always seems so calm. All teachers typically yell a little bit, or occasionally kick someone out of class, but I’d never heard or seen that happen in Mr. Williams’ class. He revealed the key to always being zen is to recognize that “…we cannot control our circumstances, we can only control our attitudes in those situations. There is never a day without problems, so you have to choose to accept that, and choose to be cool with it, because that’s just life!”
