Walking into school in the morning can be discouraging. I hear my classmates ask  “Is there going to be a pop quiz today?” “Did I do all of my homework?” “What’s in my lunch today?” But even with uncertainties, I know there is one thing I’m certain of and that when I walk to my first hour class I expect to see the happy, helpful, heroic, Mr Hessler. Wearing his NWMU shirt, or his Arrowhead apparel.

“Morning, T. How are you today?” asks Mr. Hessler each day.

Simple acts like that is one reason why Mr Hessler is my favorite teacher. He genuinely cares about his students. If I’m in any school activity, he will always ask about it. I know after baseball games or volleyball games, Mr. Hessler wants a recap of the game.

His dedication for students also translates to the classroom. He is driven to help students excel. He relates math topics so they are easy to remember. When try to prove using induction of a recursive formula equaling an explicit formula, we have to try and find Waldo. I can’t count the number of times he said, “This is Waldo. Here’s your player,” and his favorite analogy: “You can’t go swimming without water, just like you can’t do induction without the word assume.” Also, on occasion, after we have done many problems, he will show a classic Waldo problem and we have to actually find him. This helps lots of students, and myself, remember the algorithmic process we have to take to find the right answer.

Another story is when talking about repetition and order in respect to probability. As an intro to the new chapter, we solved basic problems to identify if repetition or order mattered, Mr. Hessler talked about ice cream and if order matters when getting ice cream. Normally you would think order doesn’t matter, but in his example his two older brothers would knock off the top of his ice cream dish. Mr. Hessler learned that if he were to put his favorite ice cream at the bottom, there would be no chance of it being knocked off and he could enjoy his delicious dairy delicacy.. In that example the class had a eureka moment that, yes, order did matter.

Mr. Hessler is as sharp as a pencil. He is as relatable as an older sibling. He gets students interested in math. He gets you out of you math comfort zone and expands your math knowledge. Mr. Hessler is compassionate, considerate, and challenging. This is why Mr. Hessler is the educator of the year.