By Arnold Ochoa
After 10 years of passionate teaching at Pueblo High School, Ms. Rhesa Olsen said: “It’s time to retire.”
For the past decade at PHS, Olsen taught various levels of algebra and financial math to more than a thousand Warriors.
“It’s gone by so fast, and I can’t believe 10 years have come and gone!” Olsen said. “It’s been a pleasure.”
Despite missing all her great students—past and present—she said that she won’t miss the alarm clock going off at 5:30 a.m. Monday through Friday.
Olsen’s early life was about living in many wonderful places in the country. Olsen’s father was an officer in the U.S. Air Force, so she and her family moved frequently. Her favorite places to live were Oahu, HI (grades three through five), and Alexandria, VA, where she graduated from high school.
Olsen then moved to Tallahassee, FL, to begin her teaching career in the late 1970’s at Godby High School. She then taught calculus and algebra at Tallahassee Community College and various algebra classes at Ivy Tech State College in Indianapolis.
“When I first started teaching, educators used chalkboards and mimeograph machines,” Olsen said. “I’d go home each evening with different colored chalk on my clothes, hair, and face—as well as purple ink on my hands from the stencils. Promethean Boards have certainly made teaching easier and less messy!”
After retirement, Olsen has a lot on her “To Do” list. She is looking forward to volunteering her time at a few animal shelters as well as tutoring math and reading at a local elementary school.
“I’m also excited about visiting friends and family [during retirement],” she said. “I look forward to traveling—especially to places I haven’t yet visited, including Alaska and Costa Rica.”
With so much on Olsen’s “plate” after this semester, she said that she will still miss her love of teaching and many of her students.
“I think what I’ll miss most are the times when I observed students beginning to enjoy math in my classes,” she said. “I loved seeing students ‘get it’—and when they realized that math isn’t so scary after all. I will also miss former students coming back to visit to tell me what they’re doing with their lives since high school.”
Although 10 years of teaching at Pueblo has been just a fraction of Olsen’s total educational career, she said that she will miss the camaraderie between other teachers both while at Pueblo and after hours.
“There is a lot to say before retirement,” Olsen said, “but I think what I want to say foremost is that I hope that I have encouraged students to be amazed at the beauty, fun and magic of math. I also want kids to know that one learns from making mistakes, and that they should always try. If they don’t try, they won’t know.”
Olsen would like to end her teaching career by quoting poet/writer George Eliot: “It’s never too late to be what you might have been.”
She hopes students will heed the message in Eliot’s words.