Do you know Mrs. Dougher from West Scranton Intermediate School? If you don’t know her from WSIS, you might know her from Northeast Scranton Intermediate School, or she might have taught you in high school. Mrs. Dougher is now an eighth-grade math teacher, who was born and raised in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Mrs. Dougher became a teacher back in 1994, this is her twenty-sixth year of being a teacher. She hasn’t only taught mathematics; she also taught English.          

As I was interviewing Mrs. Dougher, I asked her if she ever thought she would have been teaching virtually. She stated how she never expected to still be teaching virtually since we left school back in March 2020. Which I agree with, I wouldn’t have thought I would’ve still been learning virtually. 

I went on and asked Mrs. Dougher if she thinks teaching virtually is hard. She said, “Teaching virtually has been incredibly hard. I feel like I am teaching 24 hours per day. Since everyone is on a different schedule they hand in work and ask questions at all hours. I have had to learn to shut it down after a certain time. It’s also much harder to get your point across through a computer screen rather than in person.” Mrs. Dougher has a valid point: if I was a teacher and I had students emailing me at so many different times, I would definitely feel overwhelmed! 

Among Mrs. Dougher’s pros regarding virtual learning is that she’s able to sleep in a little because she doesn’t have to wake up early to drive to school. This might be a pro for everyone, who doesn’t like a little extra sleep? For cons, she stated how there are too many to mention!. One of her biggest cons is not being able to see her students every day and getting to know them better. Although Mrs. Dougher is not really “new” to West, she is new to WSIS, and she (as well as her famous husband, EJ the DJ), know that WEST is BEST!