Mentor

A Mentor

In life there is always a person, or role model in whom which another looks up to. Whether the person idolizes the role model for looks, wit, skills, or general personality, will vary. No matter who you are there is always someone that you attempt to emulate in some way, shape, or form. There is no limit to the amount of role models, or mentors one person can have. There may only be one person whose ideas you look at and agree with whole heartedly, or you may take portions from a vast number of others in order to create your own unique persona, and ideas. For myself, a prominent mentor was my high school Chemistry and Physics teacher, Mr. Robert Hage.

Mr. Hage was of average build, but in above average shape for his age. His hair was white, and he was never caught in cooler weather without a sweater with an odd pattern portrayed on the front. He had a love for cats, liberal ideals, a great sense of humor, and was an avid musician. In the classroom Robert Hage was what some students would call �a perfect teacher’ he was not incredibly strict, although should one of the �rowdier’ students disrupt his class he would not hand out a detention, but rather make a mockery of the student in front of the entirety of the class, in a humorous manner, only to have the embarrassed student leave the room proclaiming Mr. Hage as the �coolest teacher’ and from that point on the classroom would be void of that student’s disruptions. Robert Hage lived an expansive life through the careers of Musician, Chemist, Physicist, Author, and finally High School teacher, in which he incorporated all of his previous professions. Through this vast professional history he exclaimed great passion for everything he had done, and in doing so gained a large amount of knowledge. This is what I admired most about Mr. Robert Hage; I admired his knowledge and passion of all things he did.

In my sophomore year of high school I entered room 211 to go to Chemistry class. Previous to this I had taken a liking to science courses in my seventh and eighth grade years, as it had made a lot of sense to me and piqued my curiosity. However, my freshman year the teacher who lectured the Biology class had no interest in the subject she taught and did so half-heartedly; I started to dislike the class. So I was wary about another teacher who just wanted to get through the class more so than the students. This idea was immediately proved wrong when Mr. Hage entered the room, walked to his lab table in the front of the room, struck a match and lit a strip of Magnesium on fire. Magnesium, for those who do not know burns as bright as a welder’s torch, and as bright as my newly rekindled love for science. Mr. Hage then stated “For those of you who had doubts coming into this room, Chemistry is fun”. That was all I needed to hear in order to know that this would turn out to