Eric Bowman was one of the many new MacDuffie faculty introduced at the beginning of the year. Bowman is a part of the math department, and teaches five classes that cover Geometry and Algebra. His room is 202, next to the student center, where we met and talked.

“I originally taught in high school and then at a middle school for quite a while, so then the change was quite different, but I like it so far” says Bowman. His previous school was a middle school, but before that he worked at Francis W Parker Charter Essential School, which has a different school philosophy. It emphasizes allowing students to focus on a subject they wish to explore in depth rather than general knowledge across all subjects, a style that differs from both public schools and MacDuffie.

Bowman lives in Easthampton, and makes the trip to MacDuffie every morning. He previously lived in South Carolina where he started as an undergraduate at Clemson University, for engineering. He eventually he went back to school at Lesley University in Boston to teach math.

Bowman wants to “keep up with expectations and learn the flow, because even though it’s a very small school, it’s a little bit bigger than the school [he] taught at the last nine years” and cites the faculty, staff, and the students as very friendly and welcoming to him as a new teacher.

He goes on to say that he really likes the community and will have a lot of fun this year.