Steven Barham is an English teacher at Briar Woods High School. Last year, Mr. Barham taught at Park View High School. Mr. Barham knew he was going to be a teacher from middle school or high school. Originally, he was interested in music in high school. Later in college, he had found out he was tone deaf in his low tones. “I had to kind of change in college and kind of go in a new direction, figure out what I wanted, and I had no idea what I could and couldn’t do, but I wanted to go to education” said Barham.
One of his biggest influences in teaching was his high school physics teacher. Mr. Barham remembers what he wrote in his yearbook, “Don’t let your studies interfere with your education.” Later, Barham realized what he meant. “As you go to college, you can’t let just school get in the way,” said Barham. “I was kind of missing life.”
His favorite thing about teaching is “when students suddenly grasp something new, or you see that growth moment,” said Barham. “Kind of gives you goosebumps sometimes,” he added. He loves when his kids succeed after struggling with certain things, when they show the completeness of understanding the subject. “It was the first time they passed a class. It’s not AI or at the time, probably was not Google Translate. That was always pretty cool to see them think their hard work really did pay off, you know,” said Barham.
He decided he was going to major in English when he was asked when he was interviewed at another school. “I figured I’d try it and switch to social studies,” said Barham. “I’ve never switched. It’s not like it was destined or anything.” English has made an enormous impact on who he is today. “Like, I’ll go with this for now, and then I’m sitting here going, Okay, I’ve got a couple more years left in my career.”
During this Summer, Mr. Barham participated in church mission trips. He is a part of the Virginia early response teams. “We go in after through the Methodist Church, after tornadoes and hurricanes,” said Barham. “We clean up in people’s homes and like, cut out drywall that’s all wet, about wet insulations out houses, things like that.” Mr. Barham has been on 15 mission trips in the last 15 years. “Helping people up, verses to hand out, which is kind of cool, but that’s kind of become a thing that my family has done.”
When Mr. Barham retires, he wants to be able to relax. “I’m gonna get up on a Monday and I’m gonna sit on my back porch, orI am going to come and rake leaves on a Monday morning. That’s where I hope to be in three years from now,” said Barham. “I’m looking forward to leaving, not saying leaving education, but education has changed so much. I think I’m getting to the point where, like, I can only change so much more. I need to just let my mind be free of all of that at some point.”
