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First of all, I’d like to thank everyone who donated to my project. I am always hoping more and more people will donate a little of what they have to help those who don’t have.

A many people in the West Windsor-Plainsboro area remember, Mr. Welsh passed away about one year ago.  I say this only because soon I will begin a new year of teaching (where I’m not sure, but that’s a whole other story) and I want to remember the man who acted as my role model for teaching. I have yet to see anything in the NJ newspapers, Facebook, blogs, or the wwp-today website about Mr. Welsh this year. This is my one year tribute. In Georgia it’s traditional to hold a supra two weeks after someone’s death, then one month and year after, so on and so forth (basically there’s always a supra for someone in the past), that way they are never forgotten. The one year supra is always a special occasion, and although I’m not able to hold up a wine glass and say “gaumarjos” (cheers) for Mr. Welsh, I will pay him a tribute here in my blog.

Mr. Welsh knew that the reason I became a teacher was because of him and the influences of the other social studies teachers at WW-P South (Mr. Connor, Mr. Stuart, yes even Mr. Bond). But Welsh had the random unexplainable outbursts and random tangents that always got us interested. We learned, but we also had fun. I remember senior year he went into the teacher’s lounge to get some papers, and the entire class piled into the elevator which was in the classroom (yes, imagine 20 17-year olds piled into the elevator, it reeked). Everyone except one student who was told if he left class one more time he’d fail or get detention or something. So just imagine Mr. Welsh’s surprise when he walks back into the classroom and there’s Goldberg sitting all alone just shrugging his shoulders. Then imagine the whole class piling out of the elevator back into class. The look on Mr. Welsh’s face was one of amusement and disgust (“Really? All of you fit in there? That’s gross”).

Welsh classes were not always all about the subject matter of the day. Often something would get brought up that was an important “life lesson”, and Welsh would then dedicate the rest of the class to making sure we left more aware human beings (usually with a tears of laughter coming off our faces). Anybody who had Welsh knew all about his “slippery slope” and the “10 Things You Should Know Before Graduation”. I also had my AP Government class with my then girlfriend, Erin. Erin and I always sat next to each other, and I swear we were Mr. Welsh’s favorite couple (although I doubt the rest of the class felt that way), and he’d always give us some kind of advice here and there. He was always very interested in every aspect of a students’ life. He cared about the whole student, not just their academic success.

Now if any of you remember from my “About Me” I really wanted to be in the military. When that didn’t happen and I went on to teaching Mr. Welsh became my role model as well, and he knew it. I went to interview him for several assignments I did, and he even got featured on the webpage I had to make for the end project. He gave me a lot of advice about growing as a teacher, and some encouragement I still have to apply today. Mr. Welsh had a way of relating to every student in the classroom: popular, unpopular, jock, emo. Everyone had a place in the Welsh classroom. That is still something I try to do, and it’s much harder to do when in a different culture and language. In fact, I have tried some of the Welsh tactics in Georgia, and usually they just get people staring at me like I’m a complete freak, and then moreover people around town then talk about how strange and uncouth I am. Yes, Mr. Welsh was probably uncouth, but he got the job done, and people loved him for it.

I never actually tried to understand Mr. Welsh’s personal life. Mr. Welsh was a teacher and therefore he separated his personal and professional life completely. He told me this one story (I won’t go into detail) where he gave the middle finger to a Disney character in front of the entire senior class during senior class trip because he was unable to separate his personal and professional life. Here in Keda it’s almost impossible for me to do that. Of course I don’t act like my real self in front of students, because I am not their “friend”. Those few times that I do I always regret later. Also, it’s normal for everyone to know your business here. I do whatever I can to hide certain things about my personal life from my students. It’s funny because sometimes my host mother will just start talking about my personal life to guests and such when students are present. My host father always looks at her like: “What are you doing? That is not allowed”.

Mr. Welsh also made sure to tell me that it could take me 4 or 5 years of teaching to really feel comfortable in front of the classroom. 4 or 5 years to be in the position like he was in front of the classroom! Mr. Welsh loved teaching. And I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t admit it, but he loved the way students saw him. We loved the way he would walk around the school with a boisterous yell just to say “Hello”. He made WW-P South. And I think the whole North vs. South argument is put to an end just because we had Welsh.

Wherever you are Mr. Welsh you are certainly not forgotten.