By Edward Denny
Founder and Headmaster of Sierra Prep
Many years ago, one of my students—a particularly brilliant student—came to me with a problem.
I was teaching chemistry and physics at the time, and he was puzzled by Galileo’s famous thought experiment concerning gravity. “I understand the formulas and concepts we study in class, and I realize Galileo must be right, given all we know, but I just don’t believe it.”
I asked, “Believe what, exactly?”
“I can’t believe two objects of different mass will fall at exactly the same rate and hit the ground at the same time,” he said with frustration.
Being the teacher I am, I responded, “Hmmmm,” which, apparently, was not very helpful.
So, we tried doing experiments to construct a convincing argument, and I remember wishing we lived closer to the Leaning Tower of Pisa to reconstruct Galileo’s experiment, which disproved Aristotle’s theory of gravity. But alas, Tempe was too far from Pisa, and the administrators at Arizona State University frown on dropping things from the top of the Physical Sciences building.
After much discussion with me and other teachers, he eventually was convinced intellectually if not spiritually, and went off to college to reinvent computers and have a fantastic career in the tech world.
Years later, just a few weeks ago in fact, that same student, Joseph Irvine, who is now Sierra Prep’s IT guru and on the board of directors, sent me a photo and an ecstatic email explaining he finally was able to experience, truly experience, what Galileo had theorized hundreds of years ago. Joseph, it seems, decided to jump out of a plane.
Strapped to a tandem jumper with a combined weight of perhaps 400 pounds, Joseph jumped at the same time as a photographer, who was many pounds lighter, and they all fell at the same rate keeping perfectly even with each other. Joseph is now a believer, or perhaps better stated, a knower.
This is the kind of dedication to learning we expect from our faculty, staff and board at Sierra Prep. We take nothing for granted, and, in accordance with the Socratic method, question everything—to the point some of us are willing to leap from planes in the name of real education.
Sometimes a book, a discussion or a classroom experiment is enough to truly understand a concept, and sometimes, dramatic experience outside the classroom is required. What I particularly appreciate about our team members is their worldly experience and willingness to share with our students.
Here are just a few stories from some of our extraordinary faculty:
Eli Ferbrache (humane letters and middle school history) came to us from Ohio, with a banjo on his knee and years of experience teaching music, humanities and math, including several years in Alaska, where he was an itinerant teacher for the Iditarod Area School District. He has been a Pioneer Farm Intern at Mount Vernon, Va., a wilderness experience leader, and the president of the Contra Dance Collective, at St. John’s College.
What I find really fascinating about him, however, is the fact he spent a year teaching at Transylvania University, in Lexington, Ky., on a Fulbright Scholarship, before settling down here in Arizona with his artist wife Anne. He often reminisces about hiking the Carpathian Mountains in Romania, and he will tell fun Dracula stories if you ask him.
Physics teacher Lee Willcockson will direct the Sierra Prep Maker Space. He hails from Colorado, but recently has been working as an engineer in Minnesota. Not only was he the recipient of a 2006 Astronaut Scholarship, personally given to him by NASA Astronaut Scott Carpenter, he also is a registered EMT and a professional rock-climbing instructor.
In addition, he serves as a volunteer search and rescue backcountry ski patroller. As an avid cyclist, he will be leading SPA’s Bike Club, with our office manager Minnie Swetel who, with her husband, successfully runs the annual Chino Grinder, a 106-mile, gravel road, ultra-endurance cycling event here in Arizona.
There are too many extraordinary stories about our team to tell in one article… like the stories about Mary Beth Innes (math and economics) whose vast experience in business includes managing the launch of Verizon and Cricket in this area, or the stories of Tracy Challis (middle school dean and humanities teacher) who spent time teaching orphans in Katwe, Uganda, or the stories by and about Amy Lively (history and writing) who is widely published in the fields of history and baseball.
Finally, I would be remiss if I didn’t acknowledge Darryl Orletsky, our lead teacher of natural philosophy. He now has officially completed his PhD in curriculum and instruction in mathematics at Arizona State University. Dr. Orletsky is one of the most impressive teachers I have ever met, and all of us offer him the heartiest of congratulations for his achievement.
I am truly humbled by the people who have shown their dedication to, and belief in, Sierra Prep. If you want to meet any of our extraordinary staff, please join us for our weekly open houses in June and July. For more information, visit www.sierraprepaz.org.