“I don’t know if I ever gravitated to anything else the way I did to English,” says Lisa Baker of the English department. A “voracious reader” as a child, with an English teacher father, she always had a connection with reading and creative writing and studied both in college and graduate school.
“I learned at a young age that writing was a way to communicate,” says Lisa, “to use my imagination. Through writing you have the opportunity to shape things; it’s a small way of exerting some control, narrating ideas, making sense of experiences and human relationships.”
With two young daughters and another on the way, Lisa doesn’t have much time to do her own writing these days. However she and her husband, English faculty member Tarim Chung, find that teaching writing helps fulfill that need. “Working with the students helps keep my creative mind awake. Introducing them to new poets and writers, helping them with their own creative work, keeps that sense sharp in me. I love watching my students realize their own voice and learn to communicate it.”
Lisa teaches several of the creative writing classes at Milton, and the defining element of the course is peer workshopping. “Milton students take to that exercise so quickly—they are able to talk about a piece of work in such a sophisticated way. They’re not shy, but they’re respectful, and they offer such mature insights that their peer writers take to heart and then use to better their writing. Each of them understands that they all benefit from that experience.”
Lisa also teaches two sections of Class IV English, a course that has become a rite of passage for Upper School students. The challenge of the course is rewarded with the pride and much-honed writing and analytical skills that the students emerge with. “The Class IV English curriculum is so unique, and so detailed that it can be backbreaking for the teacher—and the students, at times—but teaching upper level English courses, I have been the beneficiary of the rigorous Class IV English curriculum. I later get to work with students who have a solid foundation of writing skills and the sophistication to use them. We see a remarkable change in the young students between September and June.”
With a broad and diverse appreciation for all types of writing, Lisa hesitates to name a favorite book, or a favorite author, but she cites William Faulkner and Virginia Woolf, John Edgar Wideman and Lorrie Moore as owning beloved spots on her bookshelf.
Lisa and Tarim have been teaching at Milton for seven years. According to Lisa, the sophistication, energy and passion of the students—and the camaraderie of her English department colleagues—may keep them here for many more years. “Milton students like ideas. They like taking intellectual risks, and they’re intensely creative. They care about the world beyond Milton, and they have very active minds. They’re talented, and working with students who have all those qualities is a special thing for a teacher.”
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