Walking through the hallways on the second floor you may notice a new name on the door of room 245. Allen Guindon is the newest addition to the Liberal Arts English department.

Following the Doty incident, Guindon, originally a long term sub for the Humanities 2 English class in room 245 has become the full time teacher. A lot of students are relieved to finally have a permanent teacher for their class. “I feel like the rest of the year is gonna go smoothly, especially now that we know that he’s the new teacher for the rest of the year, and not just another sub,” said Amelia Frober, a sophomore in Guindon’s class.

Guindon explains how he began working at South: “I was working as a special education assistant at Anishinabe Academy and I heard that this position was open… so I heard they were looking for a long call sub first for this classroom, and I put my name in the hat and got chosen to come here to teach as a long call sub.”

At first students were wary of having a new teacher halfway through the year. “I definitely think it was a little weird just because we had to switch and flip flop… but because [Guindon] was so welcoming [he] made it such an easy transition… from the craziness into a schedule again,” said Amelia Kroesch a sophomore in Guindon’s class.

Guindon made an emphasis on respecting how the students were feeling about the whole situation. As Frober said “when [Guindon] came [to South]… he’d heard a lot [about] our situation and [was] open to our ideas and, not just like ‘I’m the new teacher here and this is how’s it gonna be.’ He was like ‘what do you guys want this to be.’”

It seems many students are glad to have Guindon as their new teacher. On first impressions, sophomore Eamon Davnie was immediately drawn to him. “[Guindon] seemed like a great leader to me, I liked how he started talking to me and jumped right into the conversation after not knowing me at all.”

A common sentiment from students is that he is a welcoming and supportive teacher. “He was very understanding of our situation and… he wanted to prove to us that he was gonna be supportive of us,” said Kroesch.

Overall Guindon is excited to be teaching at South and would like to emphasize his thanks.

“I wanted, again, to thank the staff here that have been incredibly generous with their time and their ideas and their acceptance of me here,” said Guindon. “Thank you to the students for accepting me as a new teacher half way through a school year. It’s not a normal situation and they have helped me a ton to make me feel comfortable and to feel welcomed here.”