By Anne Kehl, Managing Editor
In December, English teacher Colleen Carlson announced her departure from the high school to pursue a career in librarianship. Early in January, her successor was chosen.
Queen Anne resident and (now) former Hazen High School instructor Dee Draven will be teaching Freshman English and Women’s Voices next semester, and the year after, if her contract is renewed.
Draven resigned from the Renton School District to take the position. She is a friend of math teacher Lisa Miller, which is how she found Vashon. As soon as she saw it, she fell in love.
“[My] first impression of [VHS] when I walked in was that I was in a fairytale,” said Draven.
But the brand-spanking-new school was not the only attraction.
“I sat in on all the English classes,” Draven said. “I’m seriously passionate about grammar, so I sat in on Mr. Rees’s Grammar & Craft class, and kids were talking about prepositional phrases, and I was seriously looking around for the camera. I thought I was being punked.”
Draven can’t remember a time when English wasn’t her first priority.
“It sounds really hokey and silly,” she said, “but I had a dream one night that I was an English teacher, and a cheer coach, and I woke up the next morning, and I just felt so devastated that it wasn’t real. I actually quit my job, and re-enrolled in school… and finished my certificate, because I didn’t have that much left. And here I am.”
Going on her fourteenth year teaching, Draven claims to be very demanding, but the most rewarding aspect of her classes is the connection she has with students.
“I love to just analyze how language works, but I also just really appreciate that relationship with students,” she said. “I think I’m a pretty rigorous teacher, and it’s really important to establish those relationships, because… you’re really putting yourself out there to struggle. It’s important to build that relationship so that students understand that we’re all struggling together to get to a better place… and it creates a family in the classroom.”
The kinship formed through learning something new is what makes it all worth it in the end.
“We will build a community together, so that we feel okay all learning together,” said Draven.