Compassion

As I look back on the many years spent in public schools and the numerous teachers that passed fleetingly through my life, each one made an impression on my life that has left me changed. Not all made good impressions and some impressions were simply impressions with neither significantly positive nor significantly negative impacts. The one teacher that stands out as being the most compassionate teacher I have ever come across is Mr. Doung (pronounced young).

Mr. Doung was my ninth grade honors algebra teacher. He was a short, yet hefty Korean man. Because he was born in Korea, he often forgot when it was grammatically appropriate to pluralize words. He was a wrestling coach for the middle school and he often was asking the boy who sat next to me what his weight was because the boy had wrestled for Mr. Doung previously. These things are simply miniscule details that I remember about Mr. Doung and his math class, what really impacted me about him was his compassion for his students.

Like I had mentioned previously, Mr. Doung was born in Korea. One day towards the beginning of the year Mr. Doung decided it was important that his students know how he came to America and why he became a math teacher - it was a really inspiring story. Mr Doung and his family had been black listed essentially in Korea and had to take small boats in the middle of the night to neighboring countries to escape from persecution. Eventually making it to America, Mr Doung had a hard time becoming acclimated to an entirely english speaking, foreign environment. He hated school because he couldn't speak english well so he associated himself with people who didn't care about grades. He became tough and fought a lot.

His freshmen year of high school, the school's football coach took notice of him and asked him to play football for the team. Mr. Doung wanted to join, but his grades weren't sufficient enough for him to play. So his football coach got him the help he needed. Mr Doung came to have an appreciation for math especially because it was the same no matter what language you spoke. Finally things were making sense for him. He accredits his success in high school to his football coach who took the time to support him and get him the help he needed. In response to what his football coach did for him, Mr. Doung decided that that is exactly what he wanted to do for all students! So, he became a math teacher.

This was a very inspiring story, but it was more than the story that made Mr. Doung so compassionate in my mind. It was the fact that he actually followed through with his actions. His class was fun, and he got the material across. He was completely honest with students and he would go to any lengths to help a student out. He knew his students, in a way that he could confront them about issues that they were having in their lives. He supported them and empathized with them. He legitimately cared for them. He even knew his students well enough to know the difference between when they were making a silly mistake on a test or when they actually didn't know the material. I remember a few times when he would walk around the classroom during tests and simply point at my paper and whisper "negative sign." I had simply forgot to write the negative sign and he didn't want to have to take away points for little errors such as that.

There was one time that I was definitely on the receiving end of Mr. Doung's compassion. I hadn't turned in my homework that day, and that was very unusual for me. After class Mr. Doung pulled me aside and simply asked what was up. For some reason I felt like he just knew what was going on in my life. He ventured to guess what the stressor was and why I hadn't turned in my homework. Long story short, part of the stress was from breaking up with a boyfriend. Mr. Doung showed his compassion for me by telling me that I didn't need a man to feel worth and other similar words of encouragement. I have never met another teacher like Mr. Doung with so much care for his students well-being, let alone their academic success. All of these things make Mr. Doung the most compassionate teacher I have ever had in my academic career.