Mathematics teacher, Marist High School
Bayonne, NJ
I’ve been a Brother for 44 years, and most of them have been as a teacher. I guess I’m a control freak. There are… procedures in my math classes. I don’t face a lot of discipline issues probably because it’s all business during class time. But I’ve always gotten good feedback about the discipline and material that I gave. My principal once quoted a student who said, “Brother Maske, he don’t play.”
Students come back and say they’ve done very well. The students who took AP Calculus, those kids come back and say they’ve done just fine in college. It’s very rewarding for me.
In a sense, anybody can be a teacher. I work with lay faculty or non-brothers who are just as dedicated to educating young people as I am. They have their families. I live with the Brothers and they’re my family. It’s not that I’m better, we’re collaborators.
A major part of why I’ve remained is that being a Brother has been a good fit for me. Everyone has to work out their salvation and this is just something I felt called to do. It wasn’t like I had to, I wanted to do it. This is just me…I feel a part of The Marist Brothers.
