Desiree Lester

Class of 2004

• Clay ‘97

Congratulations on 37 successful years at one institution and it means both the institution loved you as did the students otherwise you be history. 😂

Retirement is hard step but I know you will make the most of it. Keep volunteering for the youth to teach wherever you will be and this will keep your brain stimulated and your heart will feel the good work. I am saying this from an experience where my foster grandfather David Johnson was my rock while I was at Waynflete.

Your old student, Nasir Shir

Fond regards and best wishes,

Rodger Stebbins

(Former Waynflete English Teacher and Advisor)

Nick & Sarah Armentrout '88, P'19

Best,

Jake Armentrout ‘19

Cheers,

Tucker 99

Hugs and kisses!

Betsy Smith

-Jane Spencer

-Gulaid Abdullahi

It's hard to imagine a Waynflete without you. Happy retirement and I look forward to hearing what you do with your well-earned time. Thank you for everything. Congratulations on the retirement!

<3 Chelsea Doyle '02

Shane Roy ‘91

Wishing you all the best for your next phase of life!

Sincerely,

Nancy Veroneau

-Liv Hintlian, 2016

Kai Thaler '05

Congratulations! I hope you go on to some wonderful adventures. I teach 5th grade and math. And I enjoy it. Fun to think about your classes.

Thanks again! -Sarah Lavigne 1993

Marta Filip-Fouser

(History Teacher & Advisor, 2018-2021)

Honestly, I cannot imagine Waynflete without you! Hoping your retirement brings you as much joy as your teaching brought to many hundreds if not thousands of students over the years. Safe travels to you and your family as you navigate new chapter in your life. All the best to you and yours. Mary Cullen Fallon

Congratulations on your retirement, and thank you for your many years of dedicated service to Waynflete School. I look back fondly on being in your homeroom (in the early-to-mid 90s) and truly appreciate the way you treated all of us students as peers, making learning engaging and enjoyable. I especially remember how you let me use your office computer to play games between classes, even when you probably had teaching-related work to do. That small gesture was just one of many ways you showed kindness and understanding.

Your positive impact on students like me cannot be overstated—you were truly the best.

I hope retirement brings you time to explore, relax, and enjoy all the wonderful things you’ve had to put on hold.

Sincerely,

Joe Nason

cheers,

wasita mahaphanit '14

TC, If you've never seen the movie Mr. Holland's Opus, I hope you'll take the time. It's your story too.

Bill Muller

Too much ground to cover, Tom, so I'll keep it really simple when trying to sum up what you've meant to me for 20+ years.

YOU

HIRED

ME

-Emily Guffin, '10

I disliked most math classes I had prior to Waynflete -- I've been known to fear some math classes, too -- and yet, I looked forward to being your student every day because of your patience with me and your ability to make your classroom feel safe enough for me to make a mistake. Thank you for all of the grace and space it takes to make that magical thing happen! I'll admit to never taking a math class again once I graduated Waynflete: perhaps because you taught me everything I'd need to know.

Thank you!

Jo Moore '13

I also very fondly remember acting alongside you in The Laramie Project. Truly that was one of my favorite experiences from high school and I'm so grateful that we could all be on that journey together.

Thank you for all that you've done over the years in and out of the classroom to support your students and your community. Your efforts are noticed, appreciated, and will be missed.

Anyway, here is a photo of the time Anna took her notes on a banana.

All the best,

Julia Fiori '20

I took statistics 3 times:

• Once with you in 2003/4 when it made tons of sense and I decided every single HS grad should have to take statistics

• Once in college in 2007 which was very confusing and made little sense

• Once in medical school is 2011 which was yet worse than the prior two times

I am proud to inform people that I learned more from your stats class than my undergrad or grad stats classes.

I am barely hanging in there on year 9 of teaching, can't believe you did it for 37! Wishing you a wonderfully restful retirement!

~Emily Frank

Class of 2004

After graduating in '13, I didn't go the college route. Instead, I'm now a construction worker (a union electrician, but a construction worker nonetheless). In an ironic twist of fate or whatever, my endless fascination and curiosity with math and logical/critical thinking (QED) has turned me into an anomaly: the jobsite nerd.

Nearly every day at work, I use trigonometry and geometry to bend conduit for electrical installations. Cosecant, tangent, theta, radians, pi, measuring chords to determine bend radius and arc length...and that's just the mechanical side. Electrical theory? Sine waves, phase angles, vector addition, natural logarithmic curves for transient signals in capacitive/inductive circuits, voltage vector and phasor diagrams, logic diagrams for motor control and PLC wiring, the ever-present square root of 3 critical for 3-phase circuit calculations, the backbone of the global electrical grid (shout out to the OG Tesla)...but alas, I digress.

"If you don't recognize something, turn it into something you do recognize." -TC

"How to sculpt a horse from a solid block of material? Chip away everything that doesn't look like a horse." -TC

"Columbus sailed the ocean blue in 14...14--hey, that's the square root of 2!" -TC

"One way to remember the square root of 3 is that George Washington wasn't the 3rd president of the United States, and he was born in 1732." -TC

"I always thought lambda looked like an amputated pi." -TC

Thanks for being not only my favorite math teacher but also my favorite teacher! In an era where critical thinking seems to be a lost skill, I'd like to think that your emphasis on "original thinking" when it came to geometric proofs was one of the early stepping stones that laid the foundation of who I am as a 30 year-old man. And most importantly, thanks to you, I will always remember that the square root of 3 is 1.732.

Take it easy TC ✌🏼

"Quod Erat Demonstrandum"

(Also, did you guys know he was on Oprah? Because he was)

Drew D

Congrats, TC! Enjoy retirement!

• '13 graduate

Where to begin….

My….just a few years (compared to Tom’s 37) working at Waynflete were filled with many great memories! Enjoying my time with EC definitely is at the top of the list! That said, getting to know Tom during my tenure was a close second! I remember so many times as I sat in the school bus waiting for students to climb on board, I would see Tom walking to his next assignment with his always present casual gate and all encompassing gaze. He would nod, smile and speak as he moved along. I always felt very special if he spotted me and said hello. If you ever had the privilege of riding with Tom to an event or activity, I discovered early on that listening to Tom speak and recount his many stories was much more fun than speaking myself. His Campbell Irish lineage stories were amusing! His stories of his sports coaching times were a hoot! His stories of his annual baseball pilgrimage were amazing!  Playing golf with Tom was a joy, perhaps the only time I felt I was on an even playing field with him!

I’m very hopeful that I see TC at the annual Golf scramble 2025! Gee, I wonder who it will be dedicated to. LOL

And I hope he can make it to the lunch gathering afterwards….at my joint!

All the best Tom!

Bill Fenderson

Thank you for helping to make my high school experience a profoundly important and meaningful one. I remember thinking of you as a reliable, trustworthy, and hilarious mentor. You never failed to make the class of 2018 smile. I loved writing proofs and having many "ah ha" moments in your Geometry class. Thank you for letting me join the mathletes even though I'm sure I never earned us any points, and for putting the best frees on my schedule haha! Wishing you all the best in this next chapter. I'm sure you'll make it a memorable one.

Leeza Kopaeva

-Hannah Espy '06

One of your quotes that I pass on to my students is "You will not remember the lessons your teachers teach you, but you'll remember the jokes they tell." With this wisdom in hand, I try to make sure I have a strong collection of jokes and to ignore the eye rolls that come from telling the same joke in consecutive courses.

You're always welcome to stop by my classroom to observe my attempt at replicating the joy and brilliance you brought to every class.

Thanks for everything,

Tim Whittemore '00