Eight years after joining the staff at Oak Park, social studies teacher Todd Beeck is retiring. Even though he didn’t graduate from here and hasn’t been here as long as some of the other retirees, he has made a huge impact on some of the students here at Oak Park.
Especially one student, a junior named Chuma Humphrey.
“My freshman year in his class was a great year, I would say that the fondest memory I had of him was when we all had to the voice over of ‘we didn’t start the fire’ by Billy Joel.”
In the future, Beeck said he will miss, “the comfortable routine of it all. Its like…I guess it is like its a part of your home, your routine, your daily life, so i think there will be a big hole there.”
He has been involved as girls golf assistant coach for one year and building technology coordinator for several years. He was also on the building leadership committee for all eight years of his time here.
“It was the rule of eighty. I reached the rule of eighty which is the first opportunity to retire with full benefits. My wife has been retired for four years already and I was ready to go at the first opportunity,” Beeck said, when asked why he chose this year to retire.
He has lots of memories here but his favorite was the year he had his entire family here.
“I think my favorite memory of Oak Park would have been when my wife and our daughter, and our foreign exchange student were at Oak Park. All four of us here was really neat, but it was only for one year.”
Hopefully, he will have many more memories with his family after his last year here. The entire staff and student body wishes him luck on his journey.