Math Teacher Peggy Pasche is retiring after teaching at Buffalo for 35 years. During her long career, she has made many memories that she will carry with her in the future.
“I can’t believe it’s going to be done,” said Pasche. “I started in 1977, and even to me it’s like ‘Wow that’s a long time ago.’ It’s hard to think of doing something for 35 years and then not doing it anymore. This is a wonderful place to teach and I’ll just miss all of the positive things that happen in this high school.”
She wanted to be a teacher since her ninth grade year of High School and Buffalo ended up being the only place she ever taught.
“I guess when you find something you like, you stick with it for a long time. I never wanted to get out of teaching and there are some people who do. My mother and my grandmother were both teachers and we played school as children. Plus my husband is a teacher too, so it worked out nicely with our schedules.”
Looking over her career, she has no regrets. She likes how she progressed, starting out easier with seventh graders and working her way up to teach high schoolers and higher level classes that kept her mind sharp. She was involved in many activities like being a knowledge bowl coach for 22 years and more recently scoring for boys and girls basketball. These experiences kept her involved in the school community and built relationships with students and staff.
“I’ll miss the connections with students; I honestly think it’s kept me younger than I am. I got to hang out with them and do stuff with my knowledge bowl kids. They’re quirky, but I just love them all. And I mean I’m done teaching math. I’m ready to be done with the math part, but I just like the connections I’ve had with kids all the way through. That’s what counts. I think if I had a job where I just left every day at 3 and didn’t do the connecting thing, I wouldn’t have enjoyed it as much.”
Even though she won’t be teaching or coaching anymore, she will still be keeping score at basketball games. She will also continue teaching night classes at North Hennepin which she has done for a few years. Within the next year, her husband and her plan on selling their home in Cokato and moving to the farm they bought in Altura, a small town in Southeastern Minnesota. It is an extremely peaceful place where she will enjoy working in her seven flower gardens and living in the house her husband built. They plan on traveling around Alaska and the Northeastern US in their motor home and being able to stay in one place for a long time. Pasche is sad that one part of her life is ending, but excited for another one to begin.
“I think my husband said it best when he said, ‘You kind of lose an identity because now you’re not the teacher or the coach, you’re just somebody.’ But then you can be something else. You can be a traveler or a gardener or whatever you want.”
