Each year  the Oregon Council for the Social Studies nominates an educator for Teacher of The Year. This past year, Michael Lindblad, IB history and Global Perspectives teacher, received this honor.

To earn such an award, many aspects of the nominee’s career are taken into consideration. A few examples are: their involvement in the community, where they went to school, and what they are doing to engage and inspire students.

“People are nominated, they get entered into a pool with hundreds of candidates, and then it gets weeded down by a committee that goes through resumes and what people have done in different places,” Lindblad said.

Shawn Daley, the president of the Oregon Council for the Social Studies and former GHS history teacher, commented on the how the committee came to choose Lindblad for the award.

“The committee believed he was the most demonstrative of values that a social studies teacher should have: going beyond state curriculum, teaching civic engagement and responsibility, reaching out  to kids of different backgrounds,” Daley said.

One of the values the council appreciates is the ability to be compassionate to individuals who do not share their same views, or interests.

Though it was awarded to Lindblad, he observes how much commitment many teachers and staff put into teaching their students.

“There are many different people working hard–it just so happens I was lucky enough to be nominated and got the award this year. It could have gone to many dedicated teachers,” Lindblad said.  “In particularly this building, there are many people who work inside and outside the classroom tireless hours beyond what they are required.”

He sees this award as a great opportunity to honor the career of teaching, and not just his personal career.

“It’s a really nice thing for teachers to be honored in North America because in Latin America, the societies recognize the position of teaching so much,” Lindblad said.

A unique aspect to Lindblad’s teaching career is the large amount of student teachers he has had. He takes this as an opportunity to give future teachers a taste of the classroom experience.

“You want to be a teacher and really wanting it very badly. You can be up on a hill in a classroom in college, and it sounds really good, but when you step inside a [classroom], and you got 43 people to inspire on a daily basis, [there are] a lot of things that need to be done [to] make that work correctly,” Lindblad said. “You have to be inspiring, you have to have a sense of discipline, and you have to work with all these different personalities. So I’ve tried to do as much as possible and [there are] other people in this building doing that on a daily basis [as well].”

Senior Brittany Petty was in one of Lindblad’s IB History of the Americas classes last year. One of the things that stood out to her about Lindblad was his diligence in grading.

“He takes grading seriously. He will sit there and dissect your paper for a long time. You’re not just getting points for doing it,” Petty said. “He really cares about student work.”

Students remark on his serious attitude and ability to still have fun.

Senior Joey Forrer is currently in Lindblad’s Global Perspectives class. He recognizes a few of Lindblad’s unique strategies and personality traits.

“He really actually cares about students and makes sure they learn,” Forrer said.

He continues to describe one of the ways he shows this, is by going the extra mile by creating a unique set of test questions for each of his class periods.

The board took all of these attributes into consideration, and found his passion for history to be a key point in his success as a social studies teacher,

“He loves history, he could probably teach anything he wants, but he loves history. His passion is very evident,” Daley said. “If a student goes into that class not liking history, they will grow an interest in it just from the atmosphere, and if a student already likes history, they will end up loving it.”