Name: Peter W. Baker
Age: 52
Position: Teacher, Makawao Elementary
Education: University of Hawaii-Manoa
Pastimes: Jog, swim, golf, hike

"I've always liked working with kids. It just seemed like the thing for me," said Baker, a teacher at Makawao School.

Principal Bruce Anderson said Baker knows how to help students who are behind in their studies and how to motivate them.

"They like going to his class because he really makes them feel at home," Anderson said.

Baker teaches first- and second-graders in the remedial reading/readiness program, which he proposed seven years ago.

Baker and other teachers noticed that some students entering kindergarten lacked basic skills, such as knowing when to sit and listen and how to write their names.

"We get kids in kindergarten who don't know colors, shapes and numbers one through 10, have no idea what to do with a pencil," he said.

Baker knows how to work in difficult circumstances. In 1968, he joined the Peace Corps and taught English in Liberia, the West African country founded by American slaves. He also taught in the slums of Philadelphia for a couple of years.

"That wasn't any problem, except I don't like cities."

After teaching for 18 years on the Waianae coast, he moved to Maui in 1986.

"It's great," he said.