Photo By Staff Sgt. Tabitha Kuykendall | Staff Sgt. Joseph Heitzenrater, 506th Expeditionary Civil Engineer Squadron...... read more read more
KIRKUK, Iraq - Math is a four letter word in some people's vocabulary but, luckily, one Kirkuk firefighter spends his off duty time helping his fellow Airmen tackle algebra.
It wouldn't be until later in life that Staff Sgt. Joseph Heitzenrater, 506th Expeditionary Civil Engineer Squadron, realized he actually had a knack for the subject.
"I wasn't bad at algebra; I just didn't apply myself," he said. "Then when I got out of school, I realized the value of an education. I worked a lot harder at trying to get better at it and it worked."
Sometime after Heitzenrater enlisted in the Air Force on active duty, he applied for the elite Air Force Academy Preparatory School and was accepted.
The prep school is an intermediate stage for individuals who are interested in attending the Air Force Academy. It helps students boost test scores and covers a variety of subjects they will need to be successful while enrolled in the Air Force Academy.
"I spent a year at the prep school where they crammed four years of high school into one year," he said. "They showed me all these different techniques for algebra. I couldn't help wishing I was shown those things in high school."
For personal reasons, Heitzenrater decided not to attend the Air Force Academy, but the methods he learned while at the prep school stayed with him.
When he deployed to Kirkuk the first time in May of 2008, he realized his aptitude for algebra could be used to help people who struggled with the subject.
Heitzenrater said the idea originated after he walked into the Learning Resource Center here and noticed a sign for Spanish tutoring. He talked the NCO of the LRC about tutoring people who were planning to take the algebra college level entrance program test.
"A mass of people showed up to learn enough math to pass the CLEP," he said of his first class. "Originally, I just picked a topic to talk about each night and I'd go over everything they needed to know for that particular topic. That's how it got started."
The class was a success. Everyone who attended passed the CLEP test.
"It felt good to see all my students pass the test," he recalled. "I think they had the same idea I had of never being shown these methods of how to do it like that. It made it a thousand times easier for them because it wasn't a lot of complicated stuff thrown in there. After they learned the rules, which were the hardest part, all the other processes they thought were really difficult ended up being a lot easier than what they originally thought."
Because Heitzenrater felt so good about volunteering his time during his last deployment, he decided to tutor again this rotation.
He works 48 hour shifts and gets 24 hour breaks in between shifts. It's on his unassigned days he offers the class. He not only offers the class at the LRC for anyone who wants to attend, but he also offers it to his fellow firefighters every Tuesday night at Fire Station One.
"I'm an active person," he said. "If I sit still for a long period of time and don't do anything I just get bored or lazy. I don't like to sit still; I like to be out and about."
Heitzenrater also teaches because he genuinely gets pleasure from it.
"It's a lot of fun," he said. "That's another reason I wanted to teach it again. If you really enjoy the topic you're talking about, it really engages you and you feel like you can go on and on about it. If you like it, it's really easy to get up there to talk about it."
Tech Sgt. Matthew Harless, 506th ECES firefighter and one of the algebra class students, said he was a bit worried about taking the CLEP but is now encouraged thanks to Heitzenrater providing the refresher course.
"I really haven't done algebra since high school, and my focus wasn't nearly what it is now that I'm focused on passing the CLEP test," said Harless. "It definitely makes learning it easier with his simple, relaxed style of covering the material. I'm confident that anyone who benefits from his class could most certainly pass the CLEP as long as they are willing to learn the content he teaches."
Heitzenrater is hopeful about the class he has this rotation.
"The math class is more organized from what it was last time," he confessed. "This time I have a set lesson plan of what I will talk about each week."
As long as his class is successful on the CLEP test, Heitzenrater will feel as if he's done his job.
"It makes me feel like I had some small part in something that people might otherwise not have been able to do on their own. You're helping someone get the tools, showing them that it's really not as hard as it seems. If they can get over the mental hurdle of 'oh, this is a lot easier than I thought it was,' that makes me feel good."
| Date Taken: | 02.11.2010 |
| Date Posted: | 02.11.2010 07:37 |
| Story ID: | 45212 |
| Location: | KIRKUK, IQ |
| Web Views: | 216 |
| Downloads: | 173 |
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