Diane Temple and Paula Hult retire

Diane Temple. (Photos by Lisa Aciukewicz)

Paula Hult.

Retiring is “bittersweet,” agree veteran teachers Diane Temple and Paula Hult, both leaving the elementary school this year after 27 and 20 years, respectively. While their emotions may be mixed, the feeling of the school community and of the town is unequivocal–these two wonderfully dedicated teachers have been a gift to the school and they will be greatly missed.

Both women talked about the close and caring community that exists and how much they will miss it. It has been, they said, “an absolutely wonderful place to teach.” They expressed gratitude to the parents who “are always ready to give whatever is needed.” Hult has been impressed by how parents who come into the classroom to help with reading become invested in every child, not just their own. “The children are academically successful because of what the parents do at home,” remarked Temple.

In recalling their years at the school, they talked fondly of Dick Ingmanson, principal for 23 years, who died of a heart attack 10 years ago. “He was like Santa Claus,” said Hult. “He would stop into the room, tell you what a wonderful job you were doing, and ask if there was anything at all you needed.” Temple said that “Dick Ingmanson hired teachers who he knew would do the best for the kids and then he trusted them to do it.” His legacy is a community of teachers who take care of each other, willingly sharing ideas and experiences, and lending support to one another. After losing Ingmanson, the school had a “revolving door” of administrators—five different leaders in six years. Although it was a challenge to have the administration of the school constantly in flux, they said the teachers provided leadership and maintained a sense of continuity.

Temple wanted to be teacher since she was a young girl. She was at home with her own children until they went to high school, but all that time she was readying herself for the classroom, for a job that is both “creative and creating.” Once at the school, she moved easily among grades two, three, and four, and for five years she and another teacher taught classes of combined second- and third-graders. It is a model that Temple avidly endorses: “It’s more real world.” The combined classes gave children two years to bond with one another and with the teacher, to develop at their own pace, and to assume leadership roles. Temple was happy to meet the extra challenge of juggling curricula for a multi-age classroom because of the benefits to the students. When the other teacher moved on to a different position, Temple went back to a standard second grade.

Temple mused that it is somewhat of a “shock” to herself that she is giving up the thing that she always wanted to do and that she has loved so much. But now, she said, “the same passion that drove me in teaching is driving me to pursue things I haven’t had time to do.” She looks forward to spending more time with family, gardening, birding, reading, and knitting.

Hult spent two years at Village Nursery School before starting to teach first grade at the elementary school. Reading is key in first grade, Hult said, and she feels that the MCAS test has put added pressure on the students. She said the pendulum may be swinging away from so much emphasis on the test and then laughs at herself, recalling how, when she first started, “older teachers were always talking about the pendulum swinging.” Hult has enjoyed the immigration unit of the curriculum, where parents and grandparents visit the classroom and talk about heritage. In the past four years she has reclaimed her love of painting, mostly in oils, and has taken classes. Temple remarked that she has enjoyed watching Hult’s progression by observing its reflection in the children’s paintings hung in the corridor. Hult said she feels that painting is very relaxing for children, as is music, which is why she “started each day singing.”

She will miss the children whom, every year by June, she has come to know and love so well. “Teaching is all-consuming; wherever you are, you are thinking of another lesson,” she said, but the time has come for her to “be a grandma and paint.” In addition to her own art, Hult will continue to give lessons to children; in this way she will still be a teacher in her retirement.

Both women know in their hearts that the time is right, and they are leaving teaching while they still love it. Hult remarked that “you never forget a child you have taught.” And it works the other way. One of her sons, now in his 20s, told her that he has never forgotten Mrs. Temple, whom he had in third grade—she was his “best teacher ever.” For countless children, many now young adults, Paula Hult and Diane Temple will always be remembered for the outstanding teachers they are and for the impact they have had on so many children’s lives.