By Nicky Niedermeier ’12, LighterFare Section Editor
The students of the Upper School are regarded for their exceptional academic performances. What motivates our peers? Terror. Pure, unadulterated fear of the cast of characters that make up the Upper School faculty. Here’s the list of CCD’s top four scariest teachers.
1. Mr. Dunn
For those of us brave enough to enroll in Honors Freshman Bio-Chem, despite the efforts of middle school faculty to actively discourage us, Mr. Dunn’s science class is decidedly a culture shock. Even with the annoyance of Mr. Johnston constantly tapping us on the shoulder, and expecting us to (still) find it funny six months into the school year, his class was all in all pretty easy. We were completely unprepared for the surprise that Mr. Dunn’s class would prove to be. From reading 80 pages in one night about the progress of evolution (and inadvertently stumbling upon a graphic photo of childbirth) to repeatedly being called a ‘rockhead’ after shattering a giant buret, Mr. Dunn’s class was a definite experience. Although I found it hard to look him in the eyes for a few days after the buret incident, Mr. Dunn had us prepared beyond our wildest dreams for that AP test. After a few more humiliating episodes, we got through the course with a laugh or two and moved on to sophomore year.
2. Mrs. Dunn
With the beginning of our 10th grade year my classmates and I met the other half of the dynamic-Dunn-duo. From the moment we walked into room 207 we knew it was going to be a “special” year. As soon as I realized I was going to have to decipher her lightning-speed speech while still keeping track of the questions she was asking (run-on sentences with a random student’s name attached to the end), I knew Honors English 10 was going to require a little more effort than my other classes. Not only did we have to somehow tell when she was subtly mocking us, we also were supposed to remember and recognize random quotes from 100 pages of reading. The class was by no means bad though—we laughed at other people when Mrs. Dunn tore them apart (silently, so she wouldn’t notice me), too.
3. Mrs. Butler
Ah, AP Chem—what
an class. My class consisted of, in large part, some of my best, and most distracting, friends. Despite my capacity, common to almost everyone in my grade, to get easily distracted, I was more than willing to give this notoriously-challenging-class a go. Although most of my classmates and I managed to hold it together through the first quarter, by mid-November we were lost in a never-ending flurry of increasingly intricate lab write-ups and problem sets. Despite the fact that I, and a few of my classmates, had around twenty missing assignments by the end of the year, Peebs prepared us well for college and even shared with us a few choice bits of wisdom about life.
4. Mr. Miller
After being referred to as “the freshman blob” for all three years of our high school career, my friends and I were quite apprehensive about having him as a teacher every day. By the beginning of this year, he had already openly expressed his contempt for us personally and collectively, so we were a little worried about the effect his barely contained hatred could have on this most crucial period of school. Despite my initial fear of being berated by yet another CCD teacher, I soon found myself laughing with Mr. Miller as he made fun of others. The most hilarious of these moments so far, of course, has been him throwing Henry Pease out of the class for trying to surreptitiously eat a donut (while sitting right in front of him).
Whatever this year with yet another group of CCD’s teachers brings, I’m sure it will be “memorable”.
