Story Photos
 Tim Dickinson helps his wife Alison prepare Tuesday for the opening of the school year at Mark Morris High School. The Dickinsons both are new teachers in the Longview district. Tim will teach at St. Helens Elementary School.
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Home again: The students become the teachers
Wednesday, August 27, 2008 11:42 PM PDT
By Carrie Pederson
Printable version
E-mail this articleJerry Westendorf retired as principal at Mint Valley Elementary School after a long career in education, but his tradition lives on in the Longview School District. His daughter Alison and her husband, Tim Dickinson, both 2003 graduates of Mark Morris High School, will begin teaching in the district Thursday, the first day of school in Longview.
“It does feel like I’m coming home,” said Alison Dickinson, who will teach ninth and 11th-grade math at Mark Morris.
“It says a lot about the district that we were so eager to come back,” said Tim Dickinson, who will teach second grade at St. Helens Elementary School.
The hardest part of graduating from Mark Morris was leaving her teachers, Alison said. Little did she know she would be re-joining them just five years later.
“I can’t bring myself to call my teachers by their first names,” she said.
It was a “surreal thing” when she received her classroom keys from Raelyn Hovig, a chemistry teacher who retired from Mark Morris last year. She “inspired me to go into math and science.”
Alison always knew she would be a teacher.
“I come from a whole family of teachers,” she said. Her mother, Penny Westendorf, retired from teaching business at R.A. Long High School in 2007. Alison is the youngest of three Westendorf children, and her older brother and sister also teach in Washington.
“I feel like we were kind of born teachers,” she said. “My parents always truly loved what they were doing. ... It inspired me to thinking (teaching) must be fun and enjoyable.”
Alison’s husband also said Jerry and Penny Westendorf set a convincing example.
“Being around her family as much as I was, I saw what a great choice of profession it was and what a difference you can make being a teacher,” he said.
He said he recognized the importance of being a male role model for elementary school students.
“I wasn’t one of the fortunate kids to have a male teacher in (elementary school), and I feel like I missed out a lot,” he said. “I’m happy to be able to be that person for my students.”
Tim and Alison started going to school together in the fourth grade at Columbia Heights Elementary School. But they don’t remember meeting until they were students at Cascade Middle School.
They met in band class, where Alison was a flute player and Tim played the trumpet.
After high school they both went to Western Washington University. They married in the summer of 2006 and graduate shortly afterward. They started student teaching in Lake Stevens last fall before they landed jobs in Longview this year.
Jerry and Penny Westendorf “had the same kind of story we did,” Alison said. They went to high school together and started teaching in Longview almost 35 years ago, Penny in high school and Jerry in elementary school.
Tim and Alison say they feel lucky to have both landed jobs in the Longview School District.
“We are products of the district, so as far as students as concerned, we show we are committed to the district and have a love for it because we came back to it,” Alison said.
“I can demonstrate my pride for Mark Morris because I came back and I’m from here.”
New and reassigned staff in Longview and Kelso schools:
Kelso School District
Barnes Elementary
Melanie Preiss, third-grade teacher
Beacon Hill Elementary
Ron Hutchison, principal; Shaun Campbell, special education teacher; Jennifer Sharer, kindergarten teacher; Kristen Heath, fourth-grade teacher\
Carrolls Elementary
Kimberly Emert, resource teacher
Coweeman Middle School
Katie Jansen, science teacher
Huntington Middle School
Mike Neves, shop teacher
Kelso High School
Jennifer Huff, special education teacher
Wallace Elementary School
Erin Mack, preschool teacher
Stephen Shepherd, elementary music teacher in Kelso
LONGVIEW SCHOOL DISTRICT
Broadway Learning Center
Mary Carr-Wilt, principal; Jessica Lawrence, special education teacher
Cascade Middle School
Nikki Reese, assistant principal; Digna Artiles, sixth-grade teacher; Andrew Lochhead, language arts teacher; Billie Jo Martin, psychologist; Dane Wirtz, math/science teacher; Ross Pickering, industrial technology teacher
Columbia Heights Elementary School
Jay Opgrande, principal; Sandra Ricketson, music teacher
Columbia Valley Gardens Elementary School
Kathy VanAltvorst, speech language pathologist
Kessler Elementary School
Jenny Garoutte, music teacher; Erin Jones— first-grade teacher; Holly Parr, third-grade teacher; Linda Poole, special education behavioral specialist; Lisa Sudar, media specialist
Mark Morris High School
Rod McHattie, principal; Angela Allen, assistant principal; Alison Dickinson, science/math teacher; Christopher Coffee and Ryan Smith, English/language arts teachers; Timothy Lam, industrial technology teacher
Mint Valley Elementary School
Patrick Kelley, principal; Robert Barber, psychologist; Katrina Mendenhall, title program teacher; Jill Pospichal, title program teacher
Monticello Middle School
Alanna Basta, math teacher; Allison Taylor, psychologist
Mount Solo Middle School
Daniel Head, counselor
Olympic Elementary School
Marne Connell, special education teacher; Caleb Pierce, fifth-grade teacher
R.A. Long High School
William Jeffries, David Dahlberg, math teachers
Robert Gray Elementary School
Leslie Ann Barber, speech language pathologist; Harriett Sparks, literacy specialist
St. Helens Elementary School
Brian Carter, P.E. teacher; Timothy Dickinson, second-grade teacher
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