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Sewing a Tapestry

Jennifer Waters, math teacher, celebrates 25 years at Trinity
Sewing is more than a passion for Jennifer Waters, 25-year veteran math teacher. The hobby has been a calming presence in her life since she was a teenager. “My husband can tell when I haven't been in the sewing room a while,” says Waters. “I get a little grumpy.” This hobby also fits right into Waters’ mathematical mind, especially when she makes quilts for each of her seven grandchildren. “In quilting, you’ve got to get the pieces all the right size to fit together. I think if I weren't so strong in math, I might find it very frustrating.” Her husband Joseph is quality control tech for concrete.They love watching TV together and enjoy taking vacation each year to explore a new area.
 
Growing up on land leased from the Cattaraugus Indian Reservation near Buffalo, NY, Waters earned her undergraduate degree in music from the State University of New York at Fredonia. A tenor saxophonist in high school, she started college as a music major before a bad bout of tonsillitis forced her to drop the instrument and switch to education. For grad school, she escaped the snowy winters of Buffalo and completed a master’s in statistics at the University of South Carolina. 
 
But her data analysis work for state governments left her feeling bored. “I would write a computer program to analyze that data and sit for six hours waiting for data to run. That just wasn’t me.” It was her love of tutoring friends in high school that convinced her to give teaching a try. “Watching them go from not understanding something to understanding something seemed powerful to me,” she recalled. “It felt good knowing that I could change that.”
 
She learned about Trinity through a family connection, Peggy Hefflin, and at the time of her interview, her son, Walter, was an infant, and she couldn’t find someone to watch the baby. “They didn’t seem to think it was odd that I brought my child to my interview,” she recalls noticing. “That gave me a feel for the kind of welcoming, open community it was.”
 
Tough but Caring
 
When she began teaching in the fall of 2000, she taught algebra and calculus, but it only took a year before she was able to incorporate her true love into the classroom — launching the AP Statistics course that she says has been “my baby” ever since. 
 
She says she believes former students would say she was a strict teacher. “But they would also say that I cared, that I wanted them to be successful,” she says. “I was a rule follower. In the early days, I would make them keep an organized notebook, and they didn’t like that.”
 
Other teachers have noted and praised her role as a mentor, who challenges students to reach their full potential. “She has shown countless students the importance of discipline and perseverance while reminding them that success is achieved with guidance, compassion and encouragement,” says Christy Darlington.
 
Waters cherishes the relationship she has made with colleagues over the years. “We support each other not only in our careers but in our lives,” she says. “When I worked in business and for the state, I never felt that. When a teacher leaves Trinity, there is a feeling of loss for a while. It's not just holding a spot.”
 
“Jennifer sets clear expectations and maintains a well-structured classroom environment, providing her students with a sense of comfort and predictability,” says veteran Math Department Head Charlotte Morris. “This consistency has been especially impactful in her AP Statistics classes, where her students achieve scores above both the state and national averages, year after year. It is not unusual for alumni to give Jennifer credit for their success and comfort in college level statistics classes.”
 
Running counter to her reputation as a stickler when class was in session, during off hours her classroom became known as a safe space for students to come in, write on the board, goof off and be themselves a bit. 
 
Although her son, Walter Street ’18, says he only had her for one class as a teacher, he was still able to appreciate her style of interacting with students. “I remember one student getting close to mom, and if they were having a horrible day or something happened in their life, my mom would stop what she was doing, so that she could comfort them and make sure they’d be able to get through the day,” he remembers.
 
Anna Reynolds Folliard ’08, now a licensed clinical social worker for Children’s Hospital of Richmond, remembers Waters' kindness and compassion as an advisor. “She was an integral part of my success because of how supportive she was,” says Folliard. “She believed in me when I came to her with problems and helped me face them head on. I really can't say enough good things about her. She also used to give us Hershey bars in our report card envelopes no matter what was on them. And I think that speaks volumes of who she is as an educator and a person.”
 
Accounting for her long tenure, Waters says Trinity is an “awesome place” to teach. “Faculty have as much support from administration as the students do from individual teachers,” she says. But it was sending her own son to Trinity that really took her appreciation to another level. “We talk about ‘Discover Your Path,’ a lot, but as a parent I realized how much we walk the walk, especially when it comes to the difference that we make in students’ lives. I don’t know how many schools can say that.”
 
Master Scheduler
 
When not in room A-1 preparing students to make inferences for quantitative data or build probability tables, you could often find her courtside at a Trinity basketball game, where she was the diligent scorekeeper for 15 years. “That helped me get to know some kids in a totally different way,” she says. “It would make for more levity in the classroom during basketball season.”
 
Off the court, Waters has cemented her reputation as someone who can “bring order to chaos,” in the words of Morris. Trinity has benefitted from her proctoring study halls to registering students for exams, and even creating the vastly complex master class schedule each summer. 
 
“It takes a lot of care, attention to detail, and empathy for teachers and to get the schedule right,” says Head of School Rob Short, who had been responsible for the task in previous years. “The work is demanding due to the technical, human and institutional needs that it requires. Jennifer has done masterful work.”
 
“Jennifer has always been one to step up, try new roles and diligently pursue them,” says Short. “What this shows to me is the value in her ability to see the whole school, the variety of student needs, and the wishes of her colleagues for teaching and learning.”
 
Crunching the Numbers
 
Campus Coordinator Chris McQueeney and Associate Head of School Brian Phillips are also effusive in their praise of Waters’ ability to manage the thankless task of student discipline data. “Jennifer is a rockstar at every task and challenge she faces,” says McQueeney. “She was on top of every single demerit that came across her desk. She is also great at managing teens. She is tough but always fair with students, never budging an inch when they whine about getting demerits.”
 
Brian Phillips concurs, “She was always fair and consistent when it came to applying standards, student accountability and issuing demerits,” he says. Noting her equally important sense of humor, Phillps recalled when the two joked about giving one particular repeat offender 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 demerits. “She sent me back a math formula for arriving at the number — as well as the proper "official" mathematical term for such a number!”
 
Even the College Board has recognized her talent and dedication, promoting her to the leadership team for the Advanced Placement (AP) Statistics exam, which she has graded for the last 15 years. “When a teacher agrees to grade papers nationally for the IB or the AP, they are taking that step to really understand the inner workings of the curriculum of these courses,” says Short. “Ultimately, the students benefit, the department gains more insight into the curriculum and the school is stronger due to their efforts.”
 
For the last 20 years, Waters was the lead organizer for the annual Academic Awards Assembly at the end of May. From her unique perch on stage seated next to each award, says she loved spying each awardee at the moment it dawned on them that their name was about to be announced. “It was really touching to watch the kids realize, ‘Hey, I'm getting an award!’ And most of the time they were shocked.”
 
Following the retirement of the previous head of school, she spent a few years dipping her toes into administrative work as the assistant to the head of school and the IB coordinator, while maintaining her statistics classes. Short thanked Waters for helping to make his life easier during some of the more challenging times for the school. Waters reflects: “That's the cool thing about Trinity is that you can do that even as faculty. ‘Discover Your Path’ applies to us too!”
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