Dr. Stephan Shardy grips his red pen tight and marks out another few answers on the worksheet; he counts up how many points to take off and writes the correct grade at the top. This isn’t the first time he’s done this, but he knows it’s nearing his last. On May 31, Dr. Shardy will retire from teaching.
“Without a doubt,” Dr. Shardy said, “teaching has always been a ‘calling’ rather than a profession or career.”
Dr. Shardy teaches math courses such as Algebra, Trigonometry, Calculus and Statistics for eight years at Legacy, adding to a total of 31 full years of teaching.
“I always enjoy building relationships with my students,” Dr. Shardy said. “I chose teaching because it was the path I was supposed to walk.”
Dr. Shardy will soon retire, but not without a heavy heart.
“Aside from those hundreds of students who have crossed my classroom threshold, I will miss my colleagues,” Dr. Shardy said. “I have been blessed to be part of a cadre of those who also follow their ‘calling’.”
However, Dr. Shardy doesn’t plan on quitting anything else in his life and plans on relaxing and building for the foreseeable future.
“I have some building projects around the house, and I will keep busy with ministry and Bible teaching,” Dr. Shardy said. “Who knows? Maybe I will go on the professional speaking tour and share some of my experiences with various audiences.”
Gregory Uribe • Apr 21, 2016 at 4:38 pm
Dr. Shardy was one of my two favorite math teachers I had in highschool. (Kamphaus was also awesome)
His approach to math was simple enough for me to understand, and interesting enough for me to care.
I had a friend who sat next to me in Dr. Shardy’s class that accidentally sneezed on me one day. Following this incident, Dr. Shards would periodically warn me that Jenny looked like she needed to sneeze. (Didn’t think I’d call you out Jenny Davis? Well I did. Don’t sneeze on people.)
Legacy is losing a great teacher.