Rebecca Susmarski The Register-Mail

GALESBURG In Tim Johnsons chemistry classroom at Galesburg High School, the lessons dont end when the bell rings at the end of the day.

Some of Johnsons AP students stay late for homework help or just to talk to their favorite teacher, whose supply of puns and jokes seems bottomless. Other students just stop in for a few minutes; during one recent after-school session, senior student Wilson Burton came in to tell Johnson he signed at Eastern Michigan University.

No matter how long the students stay, they all reflect the impact that Doc J has had on their lives and many others.

He had both my mom and my dad (as students), and they both still talk about him, said junior student Lauren Palmer. My dad said he was probably one of the best teachers hes ever had.

The credit Johnsons students give him recently expanded into another realm. Johnson won the American Chemical Societys Teacher of the Year award in the Illinois Heartland Local Section in March, after the chemistry faculty at Knox College nominated him for the honor. Johnson received a plaque recognizing his achievement on April 20 at the Gateway Building in Peoria.

The award came at the right time, considering Johnson will retire this school year after a 33-year career at GHS. He also taught for 10 years at Carl Sandburg College and some courses at Knox.

We were going to take AP chemistry senior year, but when we found out he was retiring, we changed our schedule so we could take it this year and have Doc J, said junior student Sophia Gebru.

Though Johnson did not plan to become a chemistry teacher when he graduated from college, watching him in his classroom makes it difficult for one to imagine him doing anything else. His calm, content smile rarely leaves his face as he captivates his students with an experiment, or tells them a joke with the dramatic build-up of a storyteller.

He once taught his students not tomake assumptions in science by igniting what looked like a candle and eating it, but it turned out to be a potato wedge. He also taught students about the chemical reaction involved in a breathalyzer test through an experiment.

Yet demonstrations and humor are not Johnsons only teaching tactics. He translates the language of chemistry into the language of teenagers by making mental associations so they remember the terms, and breaking down complex formulas step-by-step so the students can grasp them.

He makes us work for the answers, too, Gebru said. He wont just give it to us at all.

Years of experience have honed Johnsons skills. A lifelong Galesburg resident, he graduated from GHS and obtained his first job as a substitute teacher at the school. (He also met his wife, Sheryl, in the schools cafeteria, where she served lunch.)

Though Johnson majored in biology at Augustana College and had been trained to teach the subject, he soon found he liked the empirical aspects of chemistry even more.

The things you could do in chemistry were so much more fun than in biology, Johnson said. I always thought biology was a lot of memorization, but in chemistry its a lot of memorization and application.

He always enjoyed being able to make a positive contribution to society through teaching. Many of his former students have written him and said his class inspired them to pursue chemistry themselves. One of his current students, junior Rebecca Foster, plans to be a chemical engineer, and has partly been encouraged by the labs she performed in Johnsons quantitative analysis class.

That ability to share knowledge with others, as well as Johnsons passion for doing so, will remain his legacy at GHS long after he closes his classroom door.

He taught me everything I know, said John Putnam, a fellow chemistry teacher at GHS. Hes extremely dedicated.

Rebecca Susmarski: (309) 343-7181, ext. 261; rsusmarski@register-mail.com; @RSusmarski

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GHS chemistry teacher named Teacher of the Year - Galesburg Register-Mail