Wayne Younghans

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I am currently a math/special education teacher at Carteret High School in the heart of Middlesex County, New Jersey. Carteret High School is a semi-urban public high school serving about 1,100 students. It is a highly diverse district, with an almost equal mix of Latin-x, African-America, Indian-American, and students of various European descent. I teach Algebra 1, Geometry, and Algebra 2 to students with IEPs in a self-contained setting, and I co-teach Algebra 1 in a mixed setting with special education and general education students.

Previously, I worked as a special education/math teacher in Chicago for eight years. I moved to Chicago in the summer of 2011 as a 2011 Teach for America corps member and spent my time there in two different school settings: Aspira Business and Finance High School and Youth Connection Leadership Academy. Aspira Business and Finance High School is a charter school on Chicago’s northwest side. Aspira began as an organization that targeted Puerto Rican youth and offered after school programming and resources, but evolved into a full-fledged charter school network, now with schools in metropolitan areas throughout the country. At the high school where I worked (Aspira Business and Finance), we served about 600 9th-12th graders, 91% of whom are Hispanic, and 96% are considered low-income. We also had about 18% special education students and over 25% English Language Learners. Before Aspira, I worked as an integrated mathematics instructor at Youth Connection Leadership Academy, an alternative charter high school on the city’s south side, serving primarily African-American and some Latin-x students. While there for 6 years, I was given many different roles and responsibilities, such as the Union President and head our math team. I found working in an alternative school to be incredibly challenging while equally rewarding at times. In hindsight, I am in awe of how much I learned from that experience.

Prior to coming to Chicago, I was a math teacher at Colchester High School for 3 years, and I taught algebra to 8th graders at Williston Central School the year before that.

My experience at Saint Michael’s College was integral to my own personal development as a student and leader, and the math department was a very big part of that experience. The most important thing I learned at St. Mike’s that I still use on a daily basis is the ability to build strong relationships and work well with others in pursuit of a goal. I do this with my colleagues and my students, and there is no way I would be where I am today without that knowledge.

I also gained a very strong foundation in mathematics through the department at St. Mike’s. This has been crucial in my ability to plan curriculum on a long term and daily basis.

Lastly, I think about specific classes at St. Mike’s that combined my love of math and teaching. Two that stand out are the Mathematics Education Seminar and the History of Math class. They put a spark in my own learning that I often think about when envisioning how I want my students to feel in my classroom.