July 2012
NEWS
The Southwest Portland Post • 5
Rieke School teacher wins Fulbright Award, faces a year in England
By Jillian Daley
The Southwest Portland Post
Mary Rieke Elementary School teach-
er Jeff Sturges and his family were
spending spring break at his mother
in law’s Arizona home when he got
the email.
Sturges, his wife Rebecca and their
two children were about to head to
a spring training baseball game on a
sunny day in late March.
Sturges paused to check his messages
when he noticed a letter from the Insti-
tute of International Education, which
administers the Fulbright Classroom
Teacher Exchange on behalf of the U.S.
Department of State.
The letter said he had 10 days to ac-
cept an invitation to participate in the
exchange program, an opportunity to
trade jobs and residences with a teacher
in Britain.
“I just screamed: ‘Rebecca, you bet-
ter come in and view this right now,’”
Sturges said.
“And I said: ‘How do you feel about
moving to Melton Mowbray in Eng-
land?’ and she was like: ‘What? Oh my
God, oh my God’ and started scream-
ing. Then, my mother in law came in,
then the kids. We were very excited,
very excited.”
He leaves for his yearlong gig this Au-
gust. He is among 41 U.S. teachers of-
fered exchanges for this coming school
year, according to Fulbright Teacher
Exchange Program records.
Sturges soon learned the honor was
huge but comes with big changes and
some sacrifices: His life and his coun-
terpart Robert Pearce’s life are very
different.
The Sturges family of four will
squeeze into Pearce’s three-bedroom
terrace house in Melton Mowbray.
There is a washing machine in the kitch-
en, no dryer because the British line-dry
their clothes, and no dishwasher..
Sturges’ wife will leave her job at the
Oregon Convention Center to be by his
side, making them a one-income family.
The British school where Sturges
will work, in a village called Waltham,
was built in 1847 and has less than 100
students, Sturges said. He will be one
of four teachers.
Pearce, a single man, will occupy the
Sturges family’s four-bedroom home.
Mary Rieke Elementary, built in the
1960s, had 420 students last school year,
and the school has about 20 teachers,
not counting teaching assistants, Stur-
ges said.
Sturges is the first Mary Rieke El-
ementary teacher to receive the honor
and one of 42 Portland Public Schools
to participate since the program began.
He and Oregon Episcopal School
eighth grade Spanish teacher Tessa
Daniel are the only teachers from Port-
land selected to participate this year.
More than 14,000 U.S. teachers have
participated in the Classroom Teacher
Exchange, one of many Fulbright
Hillsdale
Business
and Professional Association
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Sunday, July 29th, 8:30am-noon,
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$6 Adults, $4 Children, Plus... Our annual
Hillsdale Benefit Booksale 10 am-3 pm
Anne Slocom-Edmund - Optometric Physician
Heather Dudzik - Optician
Annie Wolf - Optometric Physician
programs, since
it was estab-
lished in 1946
under legislation
that former Sen.
J. William Ful-
bright of Arkan-
sas introduced.
Seven coun-
tries participate,
and Sturges chose
Britain because
it was the only
country where
he could teach
primary school
and did not have
Mary Rieke Elementary School teacher Jeff Sturges is one of
to be fluent in the
41 teachers in the U.S. to be awarded a Fulbright Classroom
country’s mother
Teacher Exchange. Sturges accepted and will be teaching in
tongue.
England this coming school year. (Post photo by Jillian Daley)
Applicants to
the program must have at least 5 years
He was inspired to take on a class-
of classroom teaching experience, and
room full of children after quitting his
must demonstrate a seriousness of pur-
job to stay at home for a year when his
pose and a commitment to the program.
daughter was born.
“They want men and women who
Armed with a bachelor’s degree from
will make a difference,” Sturges said.
the University of California-Santa Cruz,
Sturges said he hopes to become a
he enrolled in a Masters in Education
better teacher by putting himself in a
program at Portland State University.
new environment-- to find out what
He graduated summa cum laude.
he is doing right and what he could
He’s now been teaching for eight
improve. “Life is about taking chances
years, six of which he spent at Mary
and opportunities,” he said.
Rieke, where he seems to have made
Sturges, whose parents, grandmother
a good impression, at least on fourth-
and sister are educators, previously
grader LilyAnna Chin.
worked in the food industry, choos-
“It feels like I can trust him, and it’s
ing to follow in the family tradition a
good for everyone to know that he won
decade ago.
an award for something he really cares
about,” said Chin.
Rieke School principal Andrea Porter
is excited for the knowledge he will
bring back, and Porter said this is a
bright spot amid a mass of budget cuts
at Portland Public Schools.
“There’s so much bad stuff going
on,” Porter said. “This is a really good
thing, so we’re very proud of him, and
we’re very excited for ourselves. It’s a
win-win.”
Former Terwilliger School building
purchased by Montessori school
Sunstone Montessori School has pur-
chased the former Terwilliger School
building at 6318 SW Corbett Ave. from
the Portland School District, Sunstone
principal Cathy Newman told the South
Portland Neighborhood Association
last month.
The school is moving to the property
after eight years in the Bridlemile neigh-
borhood, Newman said.
The building had previously been
leased to the Portland French School,
and its relationship with its neighbors
was sometimes strained.
The private school installed fences to
curtail access to open areas previously
used by neighbors, and its policies on
after-hours use of the building were so
restrictive that the neighborhood asso-
ciation, which had been meeting there,
sought other quarters.
Newman said she welcomed use of
the grounds by neighbors, and that she
had had a volleyball net installed in the
front yard.
The principal was somewhat more
equivocal about another issue: a desire
by some neighbors to use the yard as
an off-leash area for dogs.
“I’m a dog owner myself, but this
is where children will be playing,”
Newman said. At the least, dog own-
ers will be required to clean up after
themselves, she said.
– Lee Perlman