A higher calling

Published 5:46 pm Thursday, January 10, 2008

Tal Anderson has been rapping for his students since he started teaching.

At his first job, a juvenile detention center in California, students would approach him after the rap and say: “That was alright, Anderson.”

His rapping has gone over well at Jackson High School too, where he now teaches journalism and AP World History. He came to the school in fall 1996.

A tall, white man with sand-colored hair, Anderson still dons big sunglasses and a baseball hat to rap a few times a year, to his students’ delight.

Students say they will miss Anderson’s raps, his kindness, hard work and humor when he leaves Jackson at the end of this school year. Anderson is headed to Uganda with his wife and five children to work at a Christian orphanage and school.

On Monday, Jan. 7, Anderson started his journalism section as usual, with an overview of the weekend’s highs and lows.

“I got some new shoes – $15!” one student volunteered.

Anderson talked about his own weekend, when he coached his second-grade daughter’s basketball team. The girls were so nervous some were crying, he said, but they had a great time once they were on the court.

The Monday morning recap is one way Anderson tries to make his classes personal.

“He’s way more of a personal teacher — he goes beyond Power Points,” said senior Janessa Rosick, who’s been in his class for three years. “He cares about what’s going on outside of homework.”

“It’s kind of like a little community in here, different from other classes, where you just leave,” said senior Trevor Hittle, a student in the journalism class. “Mr. A cultivates that. People can express opinions without being assassinated.”

Before he took the class, Hittle had heard about Anderson.

“Everyone talked about him, how cool the class was,” he said. “He’s understanding of people.”

While there is camaraderie, the journalism class and AP World History — the two courses Anderson teaches — are difficult.

And not just for the students. Anderson works 50 to 60 hours a week, and while he loves what he’s doing, the work stretches him, he said.

Newspaper deadlines at school can mean late nights.

The AP World History course requires an immense amount of knowledge, but Anderson always knows the answers, his students said.

Anderson has five children, who are home schooled by his wife, also a teacher.

But while Anderson and his students work hard, he likes to get them to lighten up.

He holds rock-paper-scissors tournaments and has a class talent show. He’s also held newspaper reunions where students from seven and eight years ago have met the current journalism students.

Anderson said he and his wife felt called to go to Uganda.

“I love Jackson – I’m not looking to leave, but this is something we’ve always been open to, mission work,” he said. “This fall, things came together.”

Anderson will be the assistant to the head missionary at New Hope, Uganda – a Christian orphanage and school. Uganda has been inundated with orphans whose parents died of AIDS, and the orphanage houses 180 children. The school serves 300 more.

Anderson has committed to the orphanage for three years. If the family returns home after that, he’d like to come back to Jackson, he said.

He thinks fondly of his teaching years, the best part of which has been his relationship with the students, he said. Posted around his room are student newspapers from the past decade.

“When I look at those newspapers, there’s a student with every story,” he said. “I wouldn’t trade it.”