Golden Apple 2000; 10 Interview with Karl Herr and William O'Keefe

That's right, and I always say when there's nobody around who can write it down and claim responsibility for it, but address your answers to me just for tape purposes. Some of my questions are going to be a little bit redundant, I'm going to start off by asking you to finish a sentence for me, you know, repeat the sentence and finish it for me. My questions are going to be cut out of all of this, so we're looking for full sentence answers, and this helps kind of establish that pattern and get used to answering that way. As some of the questions might be a little bit redundant, and that way we have a choice of which version cuts. Which response? Well, which version cuts together the best, basically. We're not looking to trap you into anything or trick you, we're just looking for, you know, sometimes a little bit different phrasing works better than that. That's it. Yeah. First thing I'll ask you, you're all, okay, is for you to spell your name, stick your name

and spell your name for us, so we make sure we get it right and give it through title as you want it to appear on screen. Okay. My name is Carl Herr, and that's K-A-R-L-H-E-R-R. The principal of Thoreau Metal School. Okay. First, I'd like you to repeat the sentence and then finish it for me. Mr. O'Keefe came to Thoreau Metal School in, if there's a real answer to that, I don't worry about it. You're looking for a year. Or a year about. Okay. Mr. O'Keefe has been at Thoreau Metal School for about, I believe this is his fifth year at Thoreau Metal School. He had been a teacher in the district prior to that at another school in the district. So he has now been at this school for about five years. Mr. O'Keefe teaches. Mr. O'Keefe teaches eighth grade Earth Science classes, and when he first came here, he also taught some vocational agriculture. So he has certification in both of those areas.

But he is teaching exclusively eighth grade Earth Science for us. Why do you think Mr. O'Keefe won the Golden Apple Award? I think Mr. O'Keefe won the Golden Apple Award because of his tremendous enthusiasm and commitment to kids. And he is in front of a group of kids, he just lights up and he has his tremendous energy. And he's all over the classroom and he's talking to kids. He also has what he refers to as safety nets to make sure that students don't fail. He does a combination of hounding and tough love and cajoling and begging and making sure that they have opportunities to get work in so that they can achieve something in his class. I think it's a combination of those factors. Can you give me an example of one of the safety nets? One of the safety nets would be, I saw Mr. O'Keefe talking to one of our and we'll call him an at-risk student in the hallway one day. He was working with a student on what can you do to complete a science fair project. Kid didn't have many ideas.

Mr. O'Keefe suggested something. Student lit up just a little bit and he honed in on that and said, great, we could do this. You could and then the kid offered a little bit of a suggestion and Mr. O'Keefe built on that and he really brought what was a little spark in the student and kind of got that going into what we might call a flame of interest. As a result of that, in this case it was a science fair project which is a major part of the student's grade. Got a science fair project out of the student and the student got a good grade as a result of that. And what's unique about Mr. O'Keefe? Mr. O'Keefe, one of the things that is unique about Mr. O'Keefe, I think is his incredible enthusiasm for the different aspects of science and in particular insects, I think you have a little footage of him working with some students looking at insects under a microscope. When you start talking about spiders, Mr. O'Keefe just, he can really go on for quite a

while about that and in a way that it's infectious, his enthusiasm is infectious at the spiders. But I think that's one of the things really unique about him is he is able to share his enthusiasm in a way that students, they can't help but get interested and get excited about science. Okay, let's change tack a little bit and focus on the through middle school. What's unique about through middle school that it would generate a teacher like Mr. O'Keefe that it would get somebody who wins a gold medal? Mr. O'Keefe, when he met you the day said something about, he claimed that he's in the middle of the pack here. I don't know that he would be in the middle of the pack. I think Mr. O'Keefe is an excellent teacher. This is a unique school in that we're very fortunate to have a number of teachers that have a lot of experience. In fact, for a more rural school, I would venture to say that our average experience level

is higher than most, roughly 12 years experience on our staff. So he is teaching in a school that has a number of experienced teachers and it's a good climate. They like one another, they work well together. I think our eighth grade team in particular this year is really worked well together and sharing ideas and developing an interdisciplinary unit, that sort of thing. So I think that's one of the things unique about through mid is good combination of experienced teachers and a good climate, people who get along well together from the staff angle. I think from the student angle, we were both a reservation and not a reservation school in the sense that we draw a lot from the Navajo reservation, we're about 86% Navajo students, but we also have a good mix of other students, some Hispanic and Anglo students. We've got good kids here.

They struggle so academically, but there's a real good attitude and effort and desire to learn and nice kids and good parents support and I think those are some of the other aspects that make this a unique place. And that was going to be my next question is how does the community, the parents, how do they plan to facilitating a teacher like Mr. O'Keefe? I think Mr. O'Keefe has very solidly established a reputation with parents that this is a teacher that cares about my child. Yes, he's going to push my child, he's going to really work to get something out of my child, but I know he is also going to put a lot of energy into helping my child succeed and so I think he really has excellent parent support, I guess I believe it at that point. Anything else you can think of, anything else you want to say about this whole subject? Mr. O'Keefe is one of a three-headed attack, so to speak, with the science fair here at this school.

It was begun really before he got here, but he, along with Josephine Willie, seventh grade science teacher and Barbie Lynch, our sixth grade science teacher, have really pushed science fair to the point where over half of our student body had completed science fair projects in our local fair, we've taken students on to the regional and state levels as well as we, this last year, this year I should say we have 10 students that went to the National Native American science fair in Minneapolis, and so there's real enthusiasm for that and again that spills over into our students who are starting to see some good results with that. You think of anything, Randy? You say it came here five years ago from somewhere else in the district? Yes. Was it fate that brought him here? Did you actually hear of his reputation and go out looking for him? I believe it was probably more fate than anything else that that brought Mr. O'Keefe here. He actually lives down the road a little ways closer to Milan and commutes here to work every day.

I was actually not the principal here when Mr. O'Keefe came to work here and so I'm not positive what all of the circumstances were but I know that he came here initially teaching primarily vocational agriculture and that really fits in with, he has also a lot of enthusiasm for one of the projects he wants to take on with the semester sabbatical that will have with the Golden Apple is putting up a greenhouse and a weather station and really kind of meshing those things together. He has a very good working relationship with our VoAG teacher with his roots so I think it must have been fate that brought him here probably family and living situation and perhaps his desire to continue to work within the school district and close to home. You mentioned that he's probably taking his semester and building a greenhouse and what is it?

Is that here at the school? Yes, these are some things that we've had a little bit of success with, we had a greenhouse that we established last year and it was not anchored properly and the wind sort of had their wear at that last spring we've sent secured another one and Mr. O'Keefe really worked hard to get some funding for that so couple of the projects that he really wants to work on here at the school with his semester sabbatical are going to be putting up actually two greenhouses and making sure that they are secured so the weather factors will not destroy them and also a weather station that has been damaged by some weather and so on and getting those in place that they can actually become more part of the curriculum. He's got a couple of other ideas up his sleeve as well, some of his own research, I don't know whether you've spoken with him about that but something you might want to pursue with him is he's discovered previously unknown species of spider on Mount Taylor and is working with a professor down at New Mexico State.

They haven't found the female yet, they've found several male species but I think it's a trap door spider I believe but he certainly could tell you much more about that. Are you sure to ask him a great yeah, anything else? I think we pretty well covered it. Yes, we are rolling. Okay, please give us your name, spell it and your title as you wish it to appear. My name is William Anthony O'Keefe. Once I'm not in formal situations, I am Billy O'Keefe. How would you like to be titled? Billy. You'd like to be titled Billy, B-I-L-L-Y? That's what people call me. I'm a post-refered K-E-E-F-E. Yes sir. What about a title teacher? I am a science teacher through middle school. Through middle school. Great. I just want to make sure we get our right. First couple of questions I'm going to ask. I'm going to phrase a little bit oddly. My questions are going to be cut out. Sure. So I'm going to ask you to repeat the sentence and then finish it for me.

Okay, would you say I repeat and I'll finish the thought for you for instance. I got into teaching because I got into teaching because I enjoy students. I left the profession for a while, worked in vineyards in Central California, came back to teaching. I really enjoy specifically the students where I'm teaching mostly on Eastern part of the Navajo Reservation and we have about 85-90% Navajo students. At this point, as I say, brothers and sisters, cousins come through. It's hard to go away. I know families.

They all know me, even the young ones. So it's sort of attached to my heart springs at this point, right here, right here. When I came to through middle school, I found... When I came through middle school, I found enough freedom to try things, try new things. Two things that I thought about, but if I am in a situation where I'm dealing too much on a day-to-day level, I could go beyond... I could teach things that I was interested in, I could try new things, I never thought of doing pitfall traps till kids loved it.

The things that I try and the kids love, it takes off like a rocket and I do it. I do it again and it's just a... They're having fun, I'm having fun. And I found enough freedom here to do that. I also found people that as time goes on depend on me being here. I've already set the sense I get and I don't want to let them down. What didn't you expect when you think of things, or what surprised you? I really enjoy... Hey, Tana. Oh yeah, this particular area is extremely pretty. I lived in one other place that was just stunningly beautiful. I was in the Andes of South America. And out here, we have four seasons. There is it.

As you get up these red rocks, there's all kinds of beautiful areas to see that I just assume nobody goes up there ever. I don't see signs of it. You go out into the zoonies, it's a stunningly beautiful area. I've been in pretty place before, I didn't know how it, but it grows on you. And I tell my students, if they ever leave here, everybody wants what they don't have. If they go to off to some big city, they're going to miss this place. And I didn't expect that. I know it's pretty, but I didn't know how much it would grow on you. We also have no tailor right over there. Hey, your students reacted to that kind of thing. Take you seriously when you say you shouldn't leave here, you're going to miss it. I mean, you know, I want to go to Albuquerque, get some big city. And they will. They'll get out there, and they'll see it, and then they'll remember me when they miss this place. They're going to remember me saying it. I told them first.

I told them so. So that's what that's what we're here for. What do you think is the most important thing about, if you can pick one thing out? I know this maybe isn't a fair question, but this is TV. Sure. What's the most important thing you find in teaching kids about science? I go through the scientific method quite a lot with science fairs. I was also trained in science quite a lot in the scientific method to, you know, with research data and publishing and such. If people can take a problem and go through sort of a reductionist dissecting of all of its part, isolated, tested, see which one stands out the most. If they get a sense of that, they're going to have a lot of control of the things that will happen to them in the future. I'm a big advocate of what science can tell people.

The newness of discovery is, I don't know anything that, except for having a family, things like that. Really, it is a very good feeling and when a student finds something new out of their data, be it how they, when the, when the ferret is most awake or when the, whether it's more awake at night time, who knew that, they didn't know that because they were watching it three in the morning. The discovery, the discovery, and when they, when they do say that and they say, oh, I found something new, I really reinforced that. Yeah, that's the good stuff, you know, remember that, you know, here, you did it. Now make sure and write a good results conclusion and, and graph it. So, how do you get kids interested in science? That's, you like it's yourself. If you like what you're doing, it's not a problem at all. And if you're an advocate of your discipline, it is, it is, there is not, you're, you don't

even need to sell it. So if you like what you're doing, if you like what you're teaching, if you're, if you're, now, if I were teaching something out of my discipline, it'd be a big stretch. I'd be doing a lot of, make it up as you go along and a lot of quick and dirty. But if you're, if you're doing what you know, you're just, you're just all the confidence in the world, having a lot of fun and spreading the fun, that's what we do. What would you, what would you do to describe your teaching style? I am energetic. And I am energetic and I, it is just, I'm not saying everybody should be. It's just my way. I, I am told I'm a little bit loud. But if I'm going to be loud, I can be loud happy as well as loud when I'm making a correction

with a, with a kid. And long as they, they understand that high energy, interested, engaged. Because of the people here, humor works well, self deprecating humor, if I make fun of myself, works wonderfully. So I do it all the time. And that's what I do. In terms, we're essentially, salesmen. And if I can sell them on education, and if I can sell them on science, we're making a good pitch. But if you believe in it, it's, it's, it's, it's not, it's effortless. That's what. This is primarily a, a Navajo school, you can even mention 85, 95, 95. Have you taught in other schools, and how does this contrast? I taught in, I was, I used to teach welding in Spanish, in the Central Valley. Well I taught, well I, I was, I was doing extension work in South America, I was at a Peace

School, I like other cultures, be different than mine. I'm part of Spanish, so I speak Spanish. But and as I, out here, you talk to the, if you talk to somebody older than me, and they'll talk English and Navajo, you know, they'll talk Spanish and Navajo. And so I'll be able to greet them in both languages and they'll light right up. I like, I like the difference. These are rural people, and they're the very best of it. And they have the best of, of all worlds out here, we've got a lot of space out here. It's, it's a beautiful place. And it's, it's easy to live here. I can't remember what your question was. Just kind of contrasting the school to others that you've been exposed to. And basically, I think you did, it's more a cultural question than anything else I can. I'll ask you next time.