This school year marks the eighth year of teaching, and first year at Woodside High School for Shawn McGarrah, a physics teacher.
McGarrah taught at Dublin High School for the past seven years, specializing in physics and engineering. He attended the University of California San Diego (UCSD) for structural engineering, San Francisco State (SFU) for his teaching credential and Fresno State for another teaching credential in Industrial Technology Education (ITE). Before realizing he wanted to pursue teaching, McGarrah worked as an engineer focusing on designing bridges.
“When I started that career, I noticed that I wasn’t really happy in the cubicle setting,” McGarrah said. “You know, four walls around me and working on projects at my desk.”
A day as an engineer in his career would consist of him receiving projects and just working on it at his desk. As McGarrah describes, he was not very happy with the job due to how isolating and trapped he felt just working in his office, stuck at a desk all day.
“I wanted to do something a little bit more personal and more personable with other people,” McGarrah said. “I remembered that I really enjoyed helping other students when I was in college, and I thought that I could kind of carry that over to a career.”
McGarrah went further to research teaching. In the process, he discovered a one-year teaching program.
“I decided I was going to look into how to become a teacher,” McGarrah said. “I thought that would be a great way to share ideas with people. I looked it up online and found a one-year program. Next thing I knew, I was teaching.”
McGarrah scored a job at Dublin High School. After seven consecutive years of teaching there, he saw a position open up here at Woodside and decided to jump on it.
“This school seemed to be a really good fit for me,” McGarrah said. “I did some research into the benefits and the salary and the commute that I would have to do to get here. [I saw] there were a lot of reasons why this was a better choice than my previous job.”
As a teacher, the primary goal is to help students truly understand the curriculum. There are several different strategies for this. McGarrah discusses his teaching style choices and how he believes they benefit student learning.
“[As a teacher], I try to make sure there are multiple visual cues whether it’s using a whiteboard in combination with the screen and a sheet of paper in front of the student,” McGarrah said. “I try to just be authentic and genuine in conversation. [Such as] being a normal person and talking to them while showing interest. I believe if students feel like you’re interested in them, that they’re going to want to engage.”
Even though McGarrah is a full-time teacher, he also has many outside hobbies and interests. Balancing work and outside life may be difficult, but he explains how he believes having both is very important.
“I just try to get out in nature and just sort of unwind and forget about work for a little while,” McGarrah said. “Other things [I enjoy doing while outside] are riding my bike, and taking my scooter around the city. I’m just trying to get outside for as many minutes as I can.”
McGarrah explains how he’s able to manage his time well and incorporate fun activities in his everyday life.
“[Usually] I’ll get up early in the morning,” McGarrah said. “I’ll try to get my stuff done as well as knowing exactly what I’m doing in the day, and execute it so that when I get home I have as little to do as possible. Even during my prep periods, I’m doing all my grading. I’m trying to make sure that you know when the bell rings, I go straight home and enjoy what’s left of my day, not bring work with me.”
McGarrah demonstrates how being organized benefits and hard work pays off.
“Anyone can become successful but you really have to work your butt off if you want to be,” McGarrah said. “There are no shortcuts, but if you put in that work, you’ll reap the rewards for the rest of your life.”
