Mr. Lenihan

Questions asked in the interview:

• What are the events in your life that you consider the most important? 
• What is the biggest challenge you believe you faced? 
• How did you overcome the challenge? 
• What motivated you to overcome the challenge?

The Story:

“Changing careers when I was 58 years old. Moving from Verizon and then trying to become a teacher, a high school teacher. At Verizon, I started out doing statistical analysis. Then I moved on to doing data analysis. For the last 10 years, I did survey analysis. I decided that when it became time to leave Verizon and change careers, I would become a teacher. To become a teacher, first I had to pass a state test to show that I know enough math to become a math teacher. Then take a 2-year program. 10 classes, you do projects, you do homework like a student. At the end of the 2 years, we had to do this thing called the edTPA. We had to take a 150-page document and do a reflection. Answer 150 pages of questions on reflections related to our teaching. And then do a video of ourselves teaching. Overall, pass the 2 years of classes and get a passing score on the edTPA. I left Verizon and I was teaching here. So it’s just a lot of late nights, a lot of work on weekends, you know, very little free time to work on projects. This took a lot of time, but now, I teach Algebra at a high school.” 

Changing careers takes a lot of motivation. Mr. Lenihan talked about where he got his motivation from.

“When I was working for Verizon I would go to Community College to teach at night. That was my part-time job. I loved it. I thought teaching was the greatest thing in the whole world. The motivation was…I really wanted to not only become a teacher, I wanted to be a really good teacher. On top of that, I’ve been a lucky person, I’ve got a lot of support from my family.”