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Jubilee teacher Walter Makowski is surrounded by the school's Grade 6 Ultimate Frisbee team.
Teacher of the Week
He loves teaching even after all this time
The Gazette
Thursday, October 9, 2008
Jubilee teacher Walter Makowski is surrounded by the school's Grade 6 Ultimate Frisbee team.
Teacher of the week is a new weekly feature spotlighting a local educator.
Name: Walter Makowski
School: Jubilee Elementary in Point Claire
Grade: Physical education, kindergarten to Grade 6
Experience: 33 years
Extracurricular activities: Jogging, hiking and biking
Hobbies: Woodworking
Most recently read book: The Collectors by David Baldacci
Walter Makowski can’t keep the enthusiasm out of his voice.
Not that he’d ever want to.
“I’m having a ball, I can’t think of anything else I’d rather do,” said Makowski, the physical-education teacher at Jubilee Elementary School in Pointe Claire. He has taught at the school and its former incarnation, Northview Elementary, since 1987.
Makowski began teaching Grade 5 and 6 students who were placed at Hudson High because of overcrowding, just after graduating from McGill University in 1975.
“It’s really funny because I started with them and when they moved on to Grade 7, I was also moved to Grade 7,” he said. “And that kept happening every year, so I had the same kids for seven years in a row.”
Those students became so attached to him, that when they held a school reunion five years ago, they included Makowski as an honorary grad.
“In fact,” said Makowski, who is slated to retire in three years, “I’ve even taught some of their children!”
Makowski, whose two children attended Jubilee, is well-known for his enthusiasm for all school events.
“All the things I do with the kids here, I don’t do alone,” he said. “There are a lot of people responsible for the work that goes on here.”
That includes the demonstration skipping team – a national educational video of the team was made in the 1990s for distribution to schools across Canada – as well as the school’s Adventure Club, in which Grade 6 students have gone cycling to as far away as the Voyageur Park, just across the Quebec/Ontario border.
“These are the things that really bring a school together,” Makowski said. “It’s team building, and that’s what makes our school the best.”