Students may assume that new teacher, Josh Singer, was always gifted in math. However, this is not the case. Mr. Singer says he always like math, but was surprisingly Singer says that in high school, he was “never a strong math student.”

By his junior year, Mr. Singer says he “had to drop Honors Algebra II because it didn’t come easily” to him. Despite these early disappointments, he later became a math teacher. Rather than dwelling that math “didn’t’ seem to click,” by college, he started to enjoy the higher level math classes such as calculus.

Mr. Singer’s passion for math continued through college. At Skidmore, Singer’s alma mater, Mr. Singer actually took classes in geology, but he decided to not continue because “the classes were not very interesting.” Contrary to his high school experience, as a college student, Singer found his true passion was math.

In addition to math, running is one of Mr. Singer’s passions. Mr. Singer states his love for running “is the same as math.” Despite not being “a running star,” he continued because he loved it. Mr. Singer states he “actually wrote [his] college essay” on his enthusiasm for running and how he was able to accept and move past the fact that he was not “the best” on the team. He started running in high school and has been running since. In college, he says he “was not part of an official team,” yet ran alone on his own time.

After college, he started formal training and running marathons. Mr. Singer recounts his experience training “as intense yet rewarding.” He states his formal training was “six months, four days a week, and about thirty to fifty miles a week.” Mr. Singer remembers his formal training in Maryland as a “long process” and reflects how running “is a science, as well as an art.” Also, while training he says he “met a lot of cool people” and used his training as a social and athletic experience. He ran the Marine Corps Marathon twice and the New York Marathon once.

Mr. Singer has applied these life lessons as a math teacher. He states, “half of what [he does] as a math teacher is making [his] students confident and making them feel like they can.”

Welcome to ODA, Mr. Singer. We’re glad to have you here.