New English teacher gets a real 'kick' from her new assignment

"Teaching is my passion, and has been since second grade," says new Sisters High School English teacher Kristy Swan.

But she's not just a teacher; she's also, unexpectedly, a coach. On her first day of school she was thrown a surprise challenge - coaching JV girls' soccer.

Luckily for Sisters High School, Swan did have soccer in her background. Her dad was a middle-school soccer coach, and both her older and her younger sister played soccer. Kristy played soccer for 14 years, but due to a knee injury she couldn't play in college.

"It has been a whirlwind, but it has been wonderful!" said Swan of her start at SHS. "On my first day in a new job, and the girls' first day in school, we had our first meeting."

There were eight girls in that initial meeting. Their roster was up to 12 at one point but typically there were only eight to nine players available to play at any given time. This meant no subs. No one could get hurt; they all needed to stay healthy. The opposing teams had 11 players on the field, and players on the bench.

However, playing short-handed and with a late start seemed to sharpen the girls' focus, and with their new coach at the helm they scored 63 goals (two girls had 14 goals each!). During league play this young JV squad allowed only six goals against them. The result - an undefeated regular season!

There are four graduating, and without a solid girls' soccer team feeding the program from the middle school, there is talk of a summer camp to get the skill level and interest up among the incoming SHS girls.

"I'm really involved across the board (at SHS), so the students know who I am. I tend to be really enthusiastic. I'm working it," said Swan. She also sees that (as a coach) being in the school daily has given the girls 'on the fence' easy access to her to help them decide whether or not to come out for the sport.

"What an astonishing group of girls," said Kristy with tears in her eyes. "I could not have hand-picked a better group of girls. The girls were incredibly appreciative. I feel blessed and lucky to be here."

A lifelong Oregon resident, Swan grew up in the one-street town of Zigzag, Oregon, and took her teacher training at Western Oregon University in Monmouth. She spent two years teaching in Gervais before her husband's enrollment in the helicopter pilots course at COCC brought them to Central Oregon, a place they always intended to live at some point.

"I love being here," said Swan. "The students and teachers here are present and engaged, there isn't a disjointed feeling. This is a special school and a special district."

Swan has spent some time out of Oregon. She and her husband lived in Cabo San Lucas for a summer, working on a housing project for the locals. She also spent the summer after her junior year at Western living with a family in Rosario, Argentina, about three hours north of Buenos Aires.

"What I pulled from Argentina was the respect for my English-language learners. What they feel and go through on a daily basis when they are in a country and in a classroom where they don't know the academic language or possibly even the conversational language. That connection is there and I can say, 'Oh yeah, I remember that feeling,'" she said.

The Swans just bought their first home, in Redmond. Kristy said, "It has been a busy time, moving across the state, starting a new job, coaching, buying a new house and moving."

Add to this her husband starting school and a new career, and they have had little time for their other passions, which include hiking, rock-climbing, horses, snowboarding and whitewater canoeing.

Swan's primary focus is on her students: "I not only want to be successful in teaching, in coaching, and in life, but I want every single one of my students to be successful."