Master educator
The magnet on Gerry Manfred’s filing cabinet says it all. Surrounded by dozens of pictures revealing the toothy grins of high school seniors, the magnet in the shape of an apple reads: “There is no substitute for a great teacher.”
As a calculus teacher at University High School, Manfred has been educating and mentoring smiling students for more than a quarter of a century.
His presence has become as much a part of the school as the Titan mascot and the crimson and gold that seeps into the veins of the U-Hi community.
Not many sporting events have gone on without Manfred’s face in the crowd, and just about every student recognizes his voice as it echoes down the hallway.
After 43 years as an educator – 42 at U-Hi – Manfred is putting down his erasable marker and retiring.
“It’s really starting to sink in that I’m not coming back next year,” Manfred said. “It feels strange.”
Manfred wears so many hats at U-Hi it’s hard to know where his absence will be felt the most.
In addition to teaching honors pre-calculus and advanced calculus, he is the senior class adviser, directs after-school detention, and is the math team coach, the math department chairman and curriculum chairman. He is the vertical math chairman for the district, and also is an advanced-placement consultant for the College Board. One year he traveled to Colorado to help grade thousands of AP exams with hundreds of other educators.
On top of that, he is an avid community volunteer.
“I’m kind of a workaholic, but I enjoy working with the kids so much,” Manfred said. “That is going to be the toughest part of my retirement, leaving the kids.”
Manfred, 64, began teaching at the old U-Hi building in 1963, when it was brand new. He sent off the first graduating class at that school, and has sent off two in the new high school since 2002.
Before he came to U-Hi, he was a teacher for one year at Cheney High School.
“I took a test (in college) that said I was supposed to become a math teacher,” Manfred said. “So that’s what I did.”
Over the years, few things have changed in Manfred’s classroom, except for maybe the students.
“It’s harder to reach those average students now,” Manfred said. “The average student has kind of fallen by the wayside.”
He blames peer pressure, the media and video games on today’s troubled youth.
He also isn’t a fan of standardized testing.
“The WASL thing is crazy,” Manfred said, referring to the Washington Assessment of Student Learning, the state’s answer to the federal No Child Left Behind Act that set the goal of having every child proficient in reading and math by 2014.
He sees himself as more of a traditionalist. In his classroom, the walls are mostly bare, and the desks sit facing forward in perfect rows.
Even when he moved into the new U-Hi building, he kept the same classroom number he had in the old school: 101.
Observers in Manfred’s classroom will see a lot of active discussion and cooperative learning. He singles students out for answers, and keeps the students engaged with a constant barrage of questions.
During a 7:30 a.m. first period class last month, he put one student on the spot for an answer, and upon getting the wrong answer, threw up his hands in the air.
“I quit,” he grumbled affectionately. The students laughed. Then he went right back to it, scribbling variables on the board.
His unique teaching style and his ability to connect personally has made him a favorite among his students.
“He’ll be all deep in his lessons, and all of a sudden just stop and ask someone, ‘So, how was your weekend?’ The conversation could go off on that for a half an hour,” said Sarah Ferris, a former student who is now a junior at Western Washington University.
“He has a really good way of understanding students,” Ferris said. “He isn’t afraid to show his human side, his personal side.”
Now an education major, Ferris said Manfred’s influence in her academic life is clearer than ever.
“I’m taking specialized math, learning ‘this is how you need to teach math to your students,’ ” Ferris said. “And everything that I’m hearing about in my education classes he (Manfred) still does.”
Students like Ferris regularly return to his classroom long after graduation and thank him for being such a great teacher, mentor and role model.
“One of the most satisfying things is when the kids come back and say ‘I couldn’t have done it without you,’ ” Manfred said. “The little things like that have made it all worthwhile.”
His classroom has a “door is always open,” policy and Manfred’s very loud, nasal voice – which many students recognize as his “teaching voice” – can be heard down the hall. When he speaks, students listen.
The heightened energy in his tone makes his passion for learning obvious.
“He could take an average student in math, and somehow he could make that student have a passion for learning, specifically mathematics,” said former student Aaron Alteneder.
Alteneder was in Manfred’s class in the 1980s. Manfred also taught Alteneder’s older brothers and sisters math in the 1960s and 1970s, and now he teaches Alteneder’s daughter, Kamin, who is a junior at U-Hi.
“My brothers and sisters thought it was odd that he was teaching still when I was there,” Alteneder said. “And here we are 25 years later and my own daughter has him as a teacher; it’s mind boggling.”
Alteneder went on to become a math teacher for 11 years at East Valley High School.
After learning of Manfred’s retirement, he decided to try and get together any of Manfred’s former students who went on to become teachers for a send-off party for the legend.
“There are probably 150 (former students) that are teaching right now because of him, and it may be many more than that,” Alteneder said. “His passion for learning is overwhelming, and I think that’s what sets him apart. He wants his students to be lifetime learners.”
Both of Manfred’s sons, Stephen and Paul, also are teachers, and after retirement he is looking forward to spending more time with his family, including his three grandchildren, and the two more on the way.
But first, Manfred and his wife of 35 years, Susan, are planning a trip to Italy – Rome, Venice, Florence. They plan to leave Sept. 6, traditionally the first day of school for the year.
Manfred’s wife retired last year from the Vanessa Behan Crisis Nursery, he said.
“She told me then that I had to retire,” Manfred said. “And go out on a good note.”