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Photograph by Skye Dunlap
Cupertino High teacher and coach Jay Lawson calls teaching and coaching wrestling the prefect job. Lawson's peers selected him teacher of the year for CHS on March 7.
Lawson honored for teaching efforts
By Michelle Alaimo
Jay Lawson, a history teacher and wrestling coach, whom many Cupertino High School students consider a second father, was named teacher of the year by his peers on March 7.
Lawson said he was overcome with shock when he learned of the news. "I just about passed out when I found out I had been selected," Lawson said. "It makes me feel good that other teachers appreciate what I do."
CHS principal Barbara Nunes said students and teachers hold Lawson in high regard, because he is caring and willing to help whenever problems arise.
Teaching is a family affair for Lawson, the father of two teenage girls. Both his parents taught in elementary schools in Cupertino and his brother is a third-grade elementary schoolteacher. His wife, Patricia, is a special-education teacher at Fremont High School.
While the Homestead High School graduate said he originally planned to teach elementary school, he decided to teach high school because it offered the opportunity to coach wrestling. When an opening came up at CHS for a wrestling coach position, Lawson said, "I was in the right place at the right time."
The dedicated coach and teacher is known statewide for the Ruppel/ Bianchini Memorial Wrestling Tournaments, which he founded at Monta Vista High School before moving the tournaments with him to CHS. Nunes said the tournament is such a draw to wrestlers statewide that there is a waiting list to get into the tournament.
Lawson said he has the best of both worlds because he is able to do two things that he loves--teach and coach.
"I have the most ideal job right now," Lawson said.
Lawson returned to teaching mainstream history classes again this school year, after teaching special education for more then 20 years at three different Fremont Union High School District schools. When Lawson first started teaching in the district 24 years ago, he was a history and physical education teacher. He was then laid off for three years in the 1970s, during a time of declining enrollment. He earned his special education credential in 1979, and has taught special education, as a resource teacher, ever since.
Lawson said he really enjoyed working one on one with special education students and added that all of his colleagues have been very supportive of his choice to move back to teaching history. He now teaches 10-grade world history core classes and 11-grade U.S. history.
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Sunnyvale, California Since 1994
