“My whole experience was that,” Mr. Randall on becoming a teacher, and teaching now.
Mr. Randall sitting at his desk during fifth period Ancient Civilizations.
Upon entering room 2201 at Central Kitsap High School, immediately visible are the bright sticky notes covering a portion of the walls. “No sass allowed,” one of them reads, a violent pink color. Another describes an issue that is, most likely, prevalent in all classrooms around the school, saying “I’m surprised you haven’t gotten in trouble for being late;” the background an aggressive shade of yellow. Many of them read similarly, climbing and overlapping above a teacher desk in the corner.
The room belongs to Erik Randall, a history teacher at CKHS, and the sticky notes belong to his 4th period BEST student Carley Wilson. To anyone unfamiliar with Randall, or his classroom, such decoration might be unusual. However it seems to coexist seamlessly with Randall himself, and the teacher that students know him to be.
“He’s really funny, he’s got a lot of jokes,” Wilson, a senior at CKHS says of Randall. “I like to roast him a lot about his mustache.”
Amariah Dean, another senior at CKHS agrees, saying, “He’s very chill, very sweet. Very easy to connect with him on a personal level… and he makes jokes that are actually funny.”
Daniel Sullivan, a fellow teacher and ASB advisor also speaks to Randall’s sense of humor, saying “His sense of humor, maybe could go over the heads of a lot of students, and adults a lot of times, but for him I think that makes it funnier… I think [the] part of his humor which is so weird and unique, is that if other people are just like completely confused, that is way better for him.”
Sullivan goes on to speak about a joke that Randall pulled off in a staff meeting, last year, that did go over the heads of quite a few people. “I was on paternity leave… and he said something to the effect of, ‘and also thoughts a prayers out to Danny Sullivan because of that tragic murphy bed accident, and he couldn’t get out for ten hours.’”
Sullivan reports had “a lot of people” later in the year send him emails asking if he was “doing ok” or pop into his office to ask if there were any “lingering concerns,” which he said for Randall, made it one for the Hall of Fame.
Randall grew up in Poulsbo and said that he didn’t always know that he wanted to be a teacher.
“I think I started entertaining the idea of being a teacher, [as] like a junior or senior in highschool… I got to high school, I really liked it, and I think a large part of it was the teachers,” Randall says.
Before that, however, in elementary and middle school, his experience was much different.
“I wasn’t a kid that a lot of teachers liked, and I had ADHD so I wouldn’t sit down…,” he says, “ in one of my classes I sat wedged between a sink and a cabinet facing the wall because I would interrupt class too much.”
That experience is reflected in the way that he tries to teach now, and the way he hopes to be viewed as a teacher. “I try to make, it’s kind of my goal I guess, to make school a positive environment for people… who it hasn’t been positive for in the past,” Randall says. “because my whole experience was that.”
For both Dean and Wilson, he has achieved this goal, Dean saying “If you ever have any academic troubles, or [need] relationship advice, or you know, [have] problems at home, he’s always there to listen.”
And Wilson saying, “They [students] think he’s sarcastic, and fun. Yeah, he’s a really chill teacher.”
Randall is also the class of 2023 ASB advisor, as well as the former co-host of a CKHS community centered podcast, “The Caged CougarCast.“
Of being an ASB advisor he says, “I think it’s really cool to get to know students in different avenues, I think it give me an opportunity to interact with students, outside of ‘you’re turning this in for me.'”
“It’s nice to have a connection. To create a connection… beyond just like ‘hey I’m your teacher’… It allows me to get to know students in different ways,” he says.
For students coming into, or leaving his class, he says, “Even if it’s like, ‘oh Mr. Randall’s crazy’ or ‘he’s weird,’ or whatever… I just hope the majority of students feel happy. Or if not, they can deal with it [laughs].”
