Glen MacMaster moved all the way from California to teach freshmen biology at Westford Academy.

Q. Did you teach before in California?

A. Yeah, I taught for six years.

Q. What did you teach? What grade?

A. I taught biology and health. Ninth Grade

Q. How do you feel about WA so far?

A. Great, actually. I will say, one of the first things that stood out to me was being given lunch duty. I went down and I expected to have to tell students to please pick up their trash and I didn’t have to tell anybody to do that. 

Q. Where did you attend high school? What was that experience like for you?

A. I went to Wellesley High School, which is about 30 minutes from here. I was part of student council. I was the treasurer and the vice president of my class at times. I was active in sports, and the band; I played in the orchestra and the jazz band.

Q. What college did you go to?

A. I went to a few. I went to West Virginia University first, and then I went to Keene State College in New Hampshire. And then I went to the University of Washington in Seattle.

Q. Did you study biology there [college]?

A. My freshman year I took a couple different classes and Biology struck me as a fun class, so I ended up choosing that as a major. It was that or engineering.

Q. Did you always want to be a teacher?

A. No, I would say not. I explored a few different things and what I found was that I kept transitioning to jobs that were working with kids in some way. Usually not high school aged typically younger. So, I taught swimming at YMCA to three and six year olds. And then after college I taught skiing in Colorado and those kids were also more in the five to fourteen age group. It wasn’t until those experiences that I kind of realized, working with people, you know, teenagers in particular would be a lot of fun

Q. What do you love most about Biology?

A. I would say probably animal behavior and the second one is a close tie with marine biology.

Q. Were you always passionate about Biology?

A. Probably in high school is was more into math and my art classes. Bio was not at the top of my list, but then, after going to college, that would probably be when biology became more interesting to me.

Q. What other subjects or hobbies are you interested in?

A. I like, obviously, subject wise, art and physics. I’ve done pottery; a lot of mugs and bowls. So, if you come to my house for a meal you’re probably going to be eating out of something my wife or I made.

Q. What’s your favorite part about teaching?

A. Probably the moment when students realize something new…and “aha” moment or an interesting moment to them that they figured out on their own. It’s never about telling someone something, it’s way more about watching the student discover it on their own or in an activity. And you can kind of see the light up and the glow in the face and the eyes like, “oh, I get it!” and it’s amazing and they’re happy and it’s that…I feed off of that, that’s really good.

Q. What lessons do you want your students to learn from you?

A. Aside from biology, I think high school is a good time to learn life lessons as well. So I hope that, you know, they learn how to treat each other, how to talk to one another and how to get involved and try new things. Being brave, those sorts of things. I hope students take that away from their time with me.