By: Cheney Hurley –

Alan Holdorf was recognized as the Teacher of the Month, for the month of September, by the Lincoln East Rotary Club on October 18, 2017. Holdorf has been teaching at Southeast for six years and currently teaches Algebra, AP Calculus Diff and Intro to Computer Programming.

“It is a great honor to be recognized for my work and I’m very thankful that the Rotary Club took the time to essentially say ‘thank you’ to me for trying hard at my job,” said Holdorf.

Holdorf loves teaching and enjoys seeing his students engaged and interested in the material.

“My favorite part of teaching is seeing students get excited about the content. It doesn’t happen very often in math, but when a student starts asking a question about something because they’re interested, I really feel like I’ve been doing something right.”

Being a teacher is so much more than teaching the curriculum and what the district requires. In order to become a great teacher, you need to be able to teach lessons that can apply outside of the classroom and allow students to think innovatively. Holdorf is trying to enable his students by creating an environment that fosters curiosity.

“Aside from the curriculum, I hope my students learn how to be excited about learning. I love sharing random information that I’ve accumulated and we often end up discussing other topics that students are interested in. The best way to learn anything is to start with some curiosity. I try to encourage my students to ask questions and to be curious about anything and everything so they can find joy in learning,” said Holdorf. “I always love to learn new things. I’m curious about a lot of things so I love it when students share their own interest areas with me so that I can continue to learn new things myself.”

Holdorf is very deserving of the recognition and the award, but so are many other qualified and accomplished teachers, like Holdorf.

“I don’t know the criteria that the Rotary Club uses to select its award recipients, nor do I know who else was nominated, but I think we have many great teachers in the district who are all equally deserving and it just depends on who gets nominated,” said Holdorf. “If you have a teacher that you feel is doing a great job, there are a lot of awards all over the place that you can find to help give them a little bit more recognition for what they’re doing!”