Distinguished English teacher pursues passion, improves students’ writing skills

Since English teacher Marcella Mahoney was 12-years-old and playing school with her younger siblings, she knew that being a teacher was her calling. “I am the oldest of five children, so I always had to be a teacher and caregiver… so I had to take on the role of a helper to my mother,” Mahoney said. Even in school, she would be able to realize how to explain a concept to students when her own teacher did not. These instances led Mahoney to major in English and journalism at Creighton University while simultaneously earning her teaching credits.

Mahoney even models her teaching style after one of Central’s past English teachers. “Mr. Daley, who was an English teacher here for many years and teaches at Duchesne now,” Mahoney said, “Was one of my instructors at Creighton and also the department head here when I started, and I model many of my teaching practices and sense of humor in the class and high expectations after what I experienced as a student and as a colleague of Mr. Daley.”

Throughout her years of teaching, Mahoney has experienced many satisfying moments as an English teacher; however, one broad example sticks out. “[A] Satisfying moment is when the light bulb goes off and those moments don’t happen every day and sometimes they don’t have neon lights around them and there is no applause from the audience but when the light bulb moment happens… that is what I like,” Mahoney said.

Although Mahoney’s freshman honors English and junior AP English classes typically receive the stereotype of being too rough as she noted, they will prepare students for life out of high school. “Taking my classes will prepare them for college and it also prepares them for life. I know reputation is that of the meanest English teacher and it is not mean and I am not mean, anybody who’s had me knows I am not mean… but I know in college what the professors expect and there are no second chances in college and there are no second chances in life and you have to give your best effort in life so that you can succeed,” Mahoney said.

While Mahoney teaches several novels, a select one sticks out to her in each of her freshman and junior English classes. “… I love the Count of Monte Cristo because it features a tightly wound plot and my students (if they read the book), always read more than they are supposed to read because they want to find out what happens next and it’s a good first exposure to many of my freshman to classic literature because so much of what my students read in middle school is young adult fiction which doesn’t have the depth or complexity that classic literature does,” Mahoney said. “My Antonia I love more so for the beauty of the language that Cather uses to tell the story it’s very subtle in it’s sophistication but by the time we tackle that novel in the spring of junior year most of my students are at the point to see and recognize and appreciate the true craftsmanship that Cather has and that she put into that novel.”

Mahoney finds her job as an educator particularly satisfying because of her relationships with students. “Because no day is the same, I never get bored and because I love my students I love seeing them grow up,” Mahoney said. “And not just getting taller from the time when I see them as freshman to when I see them walking across the stage when they are seniors but seeing them mature and going through all those rights of passage inside and outside of the classroom.”