[Student Reporters] Two Retiring Irvine Elementary School Teachers Reflect on Their Careers

Stacey Lee/11th, Woodbridge High School

On June 23 2010 first grade teacher Cyndy Breen and fourth grade teacher Linda Price will say goodbye to their last batch of students and to their school Irvine's Meadow Park Elementary after thirty-five and thirty-nine years of teaching respectively.

Both educators have faithfully been a part of the staff at Meadow Park Elementary a California Distinguished and National Blue Ribbon School. Breen was one of the original members who opened the school in 1988 and Price started in 1995. They have both won the Teacher of the Year award for Irvine Unified School District; Breen in 1995 and Price in 1988.

Over their years of teaching the two women have ridden an exhilarating roller coaster ride with its highs and lows - ranging from classroom catastrophes to puzzling pupils to heart-tugging tears.

These are the tales of two teachers.

Breen and Price have built a friendship in the workplace because of their commonalities.

Both women were born as only children raised and educated in the Golden State. Breen was schooled at the University of Southern California and Price at Cal State San Bernardino.

Coincidentally Breen and Price started in the Irvine Unified School District in the same year - 1984. In another coincidental twist of fate they interviewed for the same job on the same day - a position at Irvine's Stonecreek Elementary.

Despite all their similarities the ladies chose the profession of education for different reasons. "We didn't have a wealth of career choices back in the 1970's" said Breen and Price. "You were either a teacher nurse or a secretary."

Price chose to be a teacher because of her own childhood experiences: "I went all through private school curriculum. It was very rigid and punitive." She did not want other children to have "unpleasant and unhappy" elementary school memories. Breen turned to teaching because of her true passion: "I always really liked kids and I always wanted a sister or a brother. I wanted to see children progress."

Because they have taught almost every grade in the elementary school system Breen and Price have an abundance of true stories of all genres. Comedic highlights of their careers come from the absurd actions of children.

Breen recalled the horrifying but hilarious event of discovering first second and third grade students smoking for the first time behind the portables - "They were green!" She remembers with a laugh. She also dealt with a lost class hamster - later found in a jar under the sink - and a schoolboy stuck in the chair of his desk - the fire department had to be called in order to saw him out.

One of Price's most entertaining adventures was retrieving a runaway child named Justin. She had to track down his address and leave school to travel to his house where she found him crouched in the bushes of his backyard. When inquired of his absence Justin simply replied "I went to school yesterday. I didn't like it I don't think I'll go again."

Oppositely tragedy has also struck during the length of their careers. For example Price attended the funeral of Justin the runaway three years ago; he passed serving his country in Iraq. Price also took matters into her own hands when cancer struck one of her second grade students. "Erica was so severely anemic that she had to be transfused every month" recalled Price. Because she was ill during the AIDS scare receiving blood from unknown sources was a risky move.

Unfortunately none of Erica's family could donate blood due to different blood types. Mrs. Price who has O negative blood gave blood for Erica after school every month for almost a year. Erica is now twenty-eight years old and her cancer is dormant.

After almost half a decade of life inside the classroom friends Breen and Price are retiring together. "I will miss the kids the most" said Breen. They both hope their students - former and current - will continue to keep in touch with them as they have in the past. Both ladies have attended numerous engagement parties and weddings and both ladies go out to coffee dinner Disneyland or bowling with their past pupils.