This summer, English teacher Dr. Edrik Lopez will be traveling to California upon winning the National Endowment for the Humanities grant, a federally funded program that awards the opportunity to study alongside seven other high school teachers at various universities and sites in California, such as Palo Alto, San Jose State, and Berkley. Throughout the two-week session, Dr. Lopez will have the opportunity to connect and learn from authors such as Khaled Hosseini, Maxine Hong Kingston, Ping Chong, Luis Valdez to many more venerable artists, writers, and scholars.
The application process for the grant included two main steps. First, Dr. Lopez was to give an overall presentation where he introduced himself and his accomplishments as an English scholar. Next, he completed an in-depth application to elaborate on his reasons for participating in the program and why he would benefit from the grant. To Dr. Lopez, this grant is an opportunity to indulge in his own passion for learning and also bring new ideas back to the Choate classroom. Dr. Lopez has already started working towards transforming the fourth form English curriculum from Composition and Literature to Literature in a Global Context.
“The main focus of the class is to balance your teaching of, for example, Kafka, but also take classes from, let’s say, Nigerian writers, or South African writers or writers from Asia, to give Choate a global scope,” Dr. Lopez said. The diverse group of voices from around the world participating in the grant is a distinguishing element of the program.
Dr. Lopez is equally as excited to learn and expand his thinking through the grant as he is to return to Choate and report his newfound knowledge. “I still get as passionate about the things that I read and teach as I was when I first learned them…that’s the thing I’m looking forward to, just hearing their stories and getting into that mode of being a student again,” Dr. Lopez said. His passion for learning and teaching is commonly seen in his classroom, and it is a quality his students greatly appreciate.
Alison Giebler ’24, a student in Dr. Lopez’s Composition and Literature class, said, “I definitely would say it’s like no other English class I’ve taken before. He opens the floor for debate and lets his students direct the conversation which helps us express our thoughts and opinions more freely than in a strucured discussion.”
Dr. Lopez truly allows students to get the most out of class. Whether it be reading or watching a video, his students can testify that he helps them reach a better understanding of the material through a more enjoyable learning experience. “He knows how to make teaching fun for students our age and how to connect with them,” Giebler said.
In his discussion-based classes, Dr. Lopez pushes students to dive deep into their work and display a readiness and willingness to share their thoughts, making sure that everyone has a chance to participate. Yuki Zhang ’24 said, “I feel like that environment helps a lot, being comfortable with each other, sharing our ideas, and it’s also really a fun environment.” Though Dr. Lopez’s classes are different in many ways from other English courses, it is clear that his students share his passion for the unique curriculum he has created. He believes the grant will allow him to further this meaningful impact. “It does fulfill one of our primary mission statements which is to create global citizens, and you can’t be a global citizen if you don’t know their literature or their arts.”
Dr. Lopez continues to positively impact the English department and his students at Choate. Head of the English Department, Mr. Mark Gosztyla said, “He’s been really good at advocating for more listening to our students, as well as providing new ways for people to think about literature that we have taught here for a long time.” This grant will allow Dr. Lopez to further his mission of bringing fresh perspectives and ideas to the table and improving the student experience in English classrooms at Choate.
