Pelczarski retires from high school

After 40 years in education, English Dept. Chairman David Pelczarski is retiring at the end of this school year.

“It’s been a great experience to share my love of reading and literature with other people,” said Pelczarski. He said that he especially has enjoyed teaching poetry and Shakespeare’s “Hamlet.”

Pelczarski said he enjoyed teaching because of the interaction with students.

“Teaching keeps you young because you’re always with young people,” said Pelczarski. “You’re watching people develop at a stage in their life where there’s tremendous growth and they’re becoming young adults.”

Pelczarski said teaching is a “time consuming, energy consuming activity,” but has found it to be very rewarding. English teacher Heather Ellis said she has seen Pelczarski work successfully with students who struggle with their learning.

“He’s very patient and calm, and I think he makes people feel like no matter what, they can,” she said.

During retirement, Pelczarski said he hopes to bike and swim more, spend time with his family, travel, and relax in his hammock.

English Department Chairman David Pelczarski will be retiring at the end of this school year after 40 years of teaching, 30 of which he spent at the high school.

Pelczarski taught a wide variety of classes, ranging from SAT prep to Visual Media. However, his favorite classes to teach were Sophomore English and AP Literature. “It’s been a great experience to share my love of reading and literature with other people,” said Pelczarski. He said that he especially has enjoyed teaching poetry and Shakespeare’s “Hamlet.”

Pelczarski has also enjoyed teaching because of the interaction with students. “Teaching keeps you young because you’re always with young people,” said Pelczarski. “You’re watching people develop at a stage in their life where there’s tremendous growth and they’re becoming young adults.”

Pelczarski said teaching is a “time consuming, energy consuming activity” but has found it to be very rewarding. English teacher Heather Ellis said she has “seen him work with students who struggle with their learning and he’s very patient and calm and I think he makes people feel like no matter what, they can.”

In addition to missing his students, Pelczarski said said he will miss the rest of the English Department. “They have been a very supportive group of people,” said Pelczarski. “They have been graciously cooperative for the number of years I’ve been Department Chair.”

Ellis said she will miss Pelczarski’s humor and “his ability to wear all of the different hats he has to wear in order to make our department run as efficiently and successfully as possible.”

Ellis said that Pelczarski has helped make her a more masterful teacher. “He’s always been really honest and frank and candid with me, which I appreciate,” said Ellis. “He’s pointed out the things I do well but he’s also pointed out the things I can improve on, and that’s really what helps a person get better at what they do.”

As far as his plans for retirement, Pelczarski said he hopes to bike more, swim more,  spend more time with his family, travel, and relax in his hammock.

“There’s this creativity aspect of teaching that’s kind of nice that everyday you go in even though you’ve taught the same material over and over again for the last 20 years you may do it a bit differently because you have different kids in front of you.

It’s fast paced and the day goes by, every day is new, it’s a different day.

I’ve seen kids who have difficulty working and succeeding and then you teach them in a specific course and they do something that’s really creative and fun and enjoyable. Or even in class, someone will make a comment that after teaching something for so many years you’ve never thought of it in that particular way and it’s really kind of nice and enjoyable.

Teaching is a real time consuming, energy consuming activity.

Hopefully someday they’ll read something or they’ll see a question on Jeopardy and will remember something they read in senior English or sophomore English

I’ll miss the daily interaction with the kids,

I can remember even beginning of this year, it was the day before we were supposed to come here and i was lying in my hammock looking at the white clouds and the beautiful blue sky and I’m thinking, oh well, tomorrow it starts again.”

Nelson may be reached at [email protected].