Sarge was a high school history/psychology teacher who was a legit bad arse. Served in Vietnam and for a time was a DI. He’d show “Full Metal Jacket” and would complain that the R. Lee Ermey character was too soft compared to him. Then he’d rip into a more insane version of Ermey from that film to prove his point. Just for poops and chuckles he kept a disarmed hand grenade in his desk drawer with the pin pulled out propped up against a book and would have disrespectful students get a stapler or something else from that drawer just to keep kids on edge thinking he was insane. He was but he wasn’t. He just wanted to establish a pecking order of “don’t eff around with me” type of vibe.

He spent three years institutionalized before he became a teacher. He never followed a lesson plan and his classes were the type where you never knew what in the hell he was teaching but you learned the subject and a plethora of life lessons. You never ever felt like it was a class. It was just more of hanging out with someone who admittedly killed people in combat.

His college advisor was the same college advisor I had since I pursued a history degree at the same university like he did, We’ve stayed in close contact and I’ve hung out with him as an adult and it’s been nothing but insane. His collection of historically significant firearms is mind boggling. US Navy pistols from 1804, 8mm Japanese pistols with Pearl grips that were only issued to officers, plus tons of other really cool stuff. The most insane stuff are the Vietnamese flags, papers, weapons, etc. that he quite possibly scavenged off of the dead bodies of Viet Cong soldiers.

I found myself as an educator for awhile before I had to get out because of BS political reasons but what worked for me is similar to what worked for Sarge. Allow yourself to be vulnerable and let students see you as a real person. Setting boundaries is essential so that you don’t get yourself fired but giving students a glimpse of who you are allows them to connect.