By Eileen Obregon

Confucius once said, “Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life,” working should, realistically, be just another activity that you cannot get enough of.

Educating students and empowering them with knowledge can be a natural gift for most teachers and here at Tustin High School there many unique teachers more than up to this at times daunting task. However, there is truly a ‘one-of-a-kind’ teacher that wakes up every morning, with a smile on his face, ready to teach his pride and joy, the so-called “delinquents” of high school, Mr. Keith Martyn.

Currently, Mr. Martyn is a U.S. History and American Government teacher and as of this month, has been a Tiller teacher for nearly 17 cherished years. “I get to do something I love and that I am very interested in, so it doesn’t really feel like I’m working…in other words, I don’t have to go to work, I get to go to work.”

Back in his early years, he attended and graduated from Corona Del Mar High School in 1989, heading to college and after that deciding to serve for the U.S. Marine Corps.

Not only is Mr. Martyn a veteran and hero for our country, but he is also hero to Tustin High School. He continually supports every sport and club as much as he can, and when he does, you’ll know it. During football season, he spends every home game announcing for the  game with his famous booming, enthusiastic voice, always showing off that Tiller Spirit. Away from the football field, this same enthusiasm for every school-wide event is one of his most remarkable traits and can put anyone in a downright happy mood.

In the classroom scene, he always has an unexpected lesson everyday. Daily life in the history class is, as student Chelsie Emlinger would put it, “far more interesting than any other class.” Most students tend to forget what has been taught in other classes as the day goes on but that’s far from being the case in Mr. Martyn’s class. Mainly, he does so by incorporating relevant, current information from the daily news, evoking thought-provoking and exciting conversation among students. Mr. Martyn is, obviously not the only teacher that makes class fun, but he has a natural kick for it–the ability to grasp any students’ attention.

Nowadays, effectively grasping a student’s attention can be rather difficult, especially with the technology at our fingertips, the implementation of Common Core, and the difficulties of understanding complex analytical questions. To temper this, Mr. Martyn engages students and their attentions by utilizing different learning styles, properly called Multiple Intelligence. Some like the ‘Visual-Spatial’ intelligence, one of many intelligences that Mr. Martyn uses, have allowed many to see and modify things in their mind. This kind of understanding of the visual world–and its relation to physical items–is valuable in solving problems, designing, and even able to visualize any topic that will be discussed that day.

It’s not just that Mr.Martyn academically expands his student’s mind with history, but he inspires many of his kids to do what they love. He actually goes out of his way to get to know each and every one of his students in his classes, to make sure each student is enjoying his class and ultimately is why he is one of Tustin High’s most beloved teachers.