Florida Catholic | Star Teacher

Teaching ‘star’

St. Brendan's science teacher has the right chemistry for national recognition.

PRISCILLA GREEAR | FLORIDA CATHOLIC CORRESPONDENT

Published: 11.23.07

St. Brendan High School’s veteran science teacher, Martha Adams, is one of four private/parochial school teachers in the nation to be recognized by the U.S. Department of Education with its 2007 American Star of Teaching Award.
PRISCILLA GREEAR | FC

MIAMI | For nearly 30 years, Martha Adams has taught students at St. Brendan High School to think critically and scientifically as they search for truth and discover their own potential.

Apparently, some listened, among them doctors, teachers, an anthrax researcher and attorney José Diaz.

Diaz, who works with Akerman Senterfitt in Miami, said he “learned more about life and myself in Mrs. Adams’ one class than I learned from almost all my other classes combined.”

“While other teachers set expectations based on grade level, Mrs. Adams set expectations at a graduate level,” said Diaz, who described his former teacher as “unconventional, relentless” and “the very embodiment of inspiration.”

“She didn’t expect you to perform well. She wanted you to realize that you could exceed your own expectations,” Diaz said.

Endorsements like that may be the reason Adams was one of four private/parochial school teachers in the nation to be recognized by the U.S. Department of Education with its 2007 American Star of Teaching Award.

The recognition, first given in 2004, is part of the department’s Teacher-to-Teacher Initiative and is given to one public school teacher from every state plus the District of Colombia. This is the first year teachers from private and parochial schools have been eligible for the honor.

Adams was among more than 4,000 nominees nationwide. She was nominated by four former students and traveled to Washington at the end of September for the award ceremony. Mother of two and a graduate of Barry University who worked as a district manager before realizing her interest in teaching and science, Adams taught at a middle school for three years before landing a job at St. Brendan High School in 1978. She quickly moved into the science department, earning a master’s degree in 1987.

Science “is such a logical, obvious thing that (students) need to see it is so wonderful, such a gift from God that we have, especially in the human body,” she said. “I want them to see that every discipline relates, is interwoven.”

The veteran science department chairwoman now teaches honors anatomy and physiology, and environmental health ethics, which she believes is the only class of its kind at the high school level. She developed it after learning that the environment had contributed to an illness she had suffered.

Last year, her students studied how compact fluorescent light bulbs emit less carbon dioxide and use less energy than incandescent ones. This year, they are writing a book on healthful living alternatives and researching the toxic effects of fumes from Ground Zero.

Adams also has had students stage a mock trial of a real case of an aboriginal tribe in Ontario whose birthrates might have been affected by environmental pollutants.

Lance Simmens, assistant to the governor of Pennsylvania, recently visited her class to speak about the global warming documentary “An Inconvenient Truth.” Her students politely grilled him with questions.

“There are problems on both sides. I want these kids (not) to go by what is said, but do their own research,” Adams said as she sat on a stool in the science lab, surrounded by boxes of mink specimens set for dissection.

Her office walls are lined with books and papers and adorned by a framed student sketch of a woman’s back, and her more than 20-year-old skeleton, Henry.

“Martha is able to present the material in a way that students learn and pay attention and start to grow to love it. She has that special gift to show others how it can be done,” said Marist Brother Angelo Palmieri, superintendent of secondary schools for the archdiocese.

Adams also is an archdiocesan specialist on the certification of teachers and directs the ongoing teacher training program at St. Brendan.

“It is the mother of all professions. It needs to be given the importance it deserves,” she said, adding that the best teachers need to be held up as role models.

Teachers, she said, must encourage students to see that “you are the only person who limits you.”

St. Brendan senior Rosie Meyer, an aspiring English teacher, said Adams helped her to believe in her own intelligence.

“I never thought that of myself. She made me more confident and open to change and to really finding out what I want in my life,” she said. “It’s great to have her finally get recognized because she deserves it.”

Return to Archdiocese of Miami Front Page

Teaching ‘star’

St. Brendan's science teacher has the right chemistry for national recognition.

Other Stories