Top Teachers
Saturday, October 18, 1997
Name: Jay Chow
Age: 32
Position: Math teacher, Waiakea High
Education: UH-Manoa
Pastime: Tinker Toys with his three children
A funny thing happens to some bright kids on the way to college, Waiakea High School math teacher Jay Chow discovered. Give them something practical like a dustpan and they can't figure out how much trash it holds. Making math problems count
Chow teaches how to figure the dustpan's volume and how to construct one out of sheet metal.
Now Chow himself is cleaning up. He was recently awarded $25,000 for teaching excellence by the Milken Family Foundation. The money will go to his mother, he said.
"I can identify with some of the problems the kids are having," Chow said. In his own days at Leilehua High (class of '83), he knew the answers his math teachers wanted but wasn't sure why they were right.
Shop classes were different. "I would take as many shop classes as I could. It was fun and I felt a sense of accomplishment."
Arriving at Waiakea High in 1993 and discovering an unused metals shop, he created two-week classes combining his two interests.
Students punch a time clock when they enter and leave. If they daydream, they have to figure out how much wasting time costs an employer. They calculate the costs of their projects.
Chow, his wife, Cheryl, and their three children moved to Hilo in 1993 because of a more relaxed lifestyle and cheaper housing costs.
True to form, he didn't just calculate the costs, he also built his house with his own hands.
Rod Thompson, Star-Bulletin
