Sad news about the passing of a dear man back east. I learned that Mr. John Shaw, aged 92 years, died earlier this month. Mr. Shaw was an intelligent, insightful, honorable and profoundly decent man. A devoted husband and father, he was loved by all who knew him.
He was also my teacher.
Mr. Shaw began teaching in the 1950s. I learned recently that, just a couple of years into his career as a teacher, he put himself in harm’s way to shield students from falling rocks on a field trip at a state park. His selflessness resulted in permanent damage to his right hand. I teared up as I read that account, since it was entirely in keeping with Mr. Shaw’s character. First, because he instinctively and wholly protected the children in his charge. Second, because, though the students in my class wouldn’t meet him until more than 20 years later, he never called attention to his own bravery by sharing that story with us. He was both noble and humble.
Mr. Shaw was my English/Language Arts teacher in 6th grade, which was my first year of middle school. Perhaps he is the reasons that I, as a school psychologist, have always felt most comfortable working in middle schools. Mr. Shaw made the curriculum come alive in his classroom. We were an urban school district, with many underprivileged families. Many might try to lighten our load, to sympathize by taking it a little bit easier on us. Not Mr. Shaw. He had higher expectations of all of us, knowing that we’d need to work even harder than our contemporaries in society to confront – and overcome – a variety of special challenges. Still, he wasn’t like those teachers who just set the bar high, demand that you clear it, and simply play the role of spectator. He set the expectations and then worked tirelessly to help you achieve the goal. Mr. Shaw would push; he would pull. He would scold; he would cheer. Most of all, he would TEACH.
Among the countless school teachers I had across different environments, Mr. Shaw’s influence looms larger than all. He fostered in us some rather exacting standards with regard to the structure and composition of language. Still more important, he showed us how language was a gateway to all other learning. How language was both science and art. At times, I am still writing to him.
As a middle school student in a well-integrated school in the 1980s, it never occurred to me that this fine man had a life that existed long before I arrived in his classroom. Such is the egocentrism of youth. My adult self tries to see the Mr. Shaw who began teaching before this country abolished Jim Crow. The Mr. Shaw who, despite injustices at home, served honorably in the Navy during both World War II and the Korean War to bring justice to others. The Mr. Shaw who had a rich and full life entirely apart from his vocation as an educator. Whatever challenges faced him long before I was placed into his classroom, he left them at the schoolhouse door. All I ever saw out of Mr. Shaw was honesty, guidance, beauty, scholarship, and support. And love. Most of all, there was his love for each of us. He reached well beyond the lines of race, gender, class, age, station, and any of the countless ways that society tries to divide us… and just loved each and every last one of us.
I am saddened to hear of the loss of such a good man. At the same time, my spirits are lifted to know that his life – a life of deep meaning – continued apace for more than three decades after we parted. He had many more happy chapters. I’m sure his family and friends enjoyed every page. I take comfort in the knowledge that Mr. Shaw has earned his eternal reward and now sings with the angels. No doubt, he is still teaching there, too. RIP.