I had Mr. Andrews for ninth and tenth grade at Arrowhead Union High School’s South Campus. Mr. Andrews is friendly, kind, and approachable. 

You might be wondering in your head. “What Mr. Andrews looks like or may be like in class”, right? Well Mr. Andrews is slightly shorter than average, kind of quirky and energetic with an amazing but oddly humorous sense of humor. He is great around kids. With knowing how to make an entire classroom laugh to the point of tears..

Every day, every class, I would never know what the activity would be, but I knew he would be engaging. I knew he would get the quiet kids involved without just calling on them unexpectedly.

His jovial side gives him a great personality for being around teenagers. When in one of his more productive classes (like me), he would treat us to an Instagram live that other students of his would join from other hours in the day to see how much fun our hour was. These Instagram lives would create a craving for each class period to work harder than the last to possibly have the chance of going “Live with Mr. Andrews”.

Mr. Andrews teaches in a way I have not seen any other teachers be able to connect with kids like. Some of the activities seem as if they are not teaching you. Like going Instagram live might not sound productive to another teacher, but he gave us a little rope so then we worked harder in class and truly were zoned in with focus.

But the reality is every single day when he is teaching all of his students to be able to work with different people we might’ve not even known. Being able to do group work in unity and synergy through teamwork and assistance.

Mr. Andrews is consistently a sensationally fun guy who knows how to relate books and readings back to teenage students in appropriate ways that were really funny!!

Undoubtedly Mr. Andrews was aware that the video game “Fortnite” could create a big distraction of students’ work time in each class period. Mr. Andrew’s embraced it though! Through talking about the game with us students and later on downloading the game and getting students to focus on their work in class, to be able to play Fortnite after school with Mr. Andrews allowed each video gaming teen to connect to Mr. Andrews another level. 

Mr. Andrews is truly an outstanding soul and Arrowhead Union High School is blessed to have someone who can connect and relate with teenagers in such a regular way. Considering the majority of male teenagers play video games and that can be a very typical but great way to create a connection from the student to the teacher. These connections are tremendous in your students' work ethic in your classroom. Especially when dealing with ninth and tenth graders.

Not many teachers have capabilities to associate a child centered game to get their students to do work in class, so they could play “Fortnite” later in the evening after school. Just certain things he does from day to day classes keep things interesting and open more students' awareness.

It could be an educational video, worksheet, group work and even hide and seek with toy dolls - I am enticed. I am still motivated to get classroom work done on time with this structure of teaching. I truly appreciated Mr. Andrews’ class when he could get all of his students to thrive together. This classroom flourished with work always getting completed on time with great quality and effort.

One day Mr. Andrews might be gone for a golf meet and the next he starts class with a cartwheel. From reading Shakespeare or even Of Mice and Men to relating it to our young immature freshman and sophmores, he always presented to his audience of classroom kids. 

Arguably, the best teacher at Arrowhead Union High School has ever acquired, could be Mr. Andrews.

No matter who you are or what you do in his classroom, if you go up to him and ask him any question, he is open to talk about it with either just you or even the whole class. Teachers that are approachable are empowering!