Mr. Derek Montgomery is a history teacher that passionately prepares for  and teaches history lessons. From a young age, Montgomery had a growing interest in history and past events.

“It started when I was in sixth grade. The subject [of history] … was inspiring and very real to me. I had a sixth grade history teacher named Mr. O’Hagen [who taught government]. A lot of his lessons were very interactive; for example, when he was teaching us how a bill becomes a law … he divided us up into groups where we had to generate laws in the class and go through the same process [as a real bill would go through]. We really got to see democracy at work. I had fallen in love with the system and the subject of history at that point,” Montgomery said.

Inspired by his role model, Mr. O’Hagen, Montgomery later decided to become a history teacher and instruct students in the same interactive ways.

“I think that history is important in a lot of ways. Although people say that you need to study history so that you don’t repeat the mistakes of the past, I think there is a lot more to it than that,” Montgomery said.

Montgomery experienced other moments where he wanted to know more about history: “When I was growing up, some of my best friends were [Hispanic] and they weren’t treated the same way as I was, so, I started getting interested in what America really stands for and why there is a difference between how I was treated and how my friend was treated because of his ethnicity,” Montgomery said. 

Montgomery’s favorite time period in history was The Gilded Age. “This was a time when cities were sprouting up, factories were becoming immense and jobs were expanding dramatically. Money was power during that time period.”

Montgomery found it difficult to choose his favorite president. “Oh no! You are going to throw that question at me,” said Montgomery. Abraham Lincoln is his favorite president overall as Lincoln was able to make the Civil War more about fighting for a bigger cause and what America stands for. Montgomery also appreciates how he fought to expand freedom.

Montgomery enjoys indulging in history research during his free time. “I usually do research at the San Diego Historical Society where I go into their archives of San Diego’s local history. I have selfish reasons [for researching history]. I definitely enjoy the lessons from history. My research also informs my teaching where I might use it as anecdote for some of my lessons or a discussion in class that might help students pick up on my lessons,” Montgomery said. 

Montgomery believes in spending extra time outside of the classroom to prepare intriguing lessons. “I think that if teachers don’t spend time modifying their lessons and doing their own research then no one knows what kind of anecdote that could have helped a student,” Montgomery said.

To Montgomery, teaching and learning history is his passion. Montgomery tries to put in time outside of school in order to feed his hunger for history, and to help with his teaching.

“I have found that most students that go to CAHS come from families that value education … I enjoy teaching them because I am able to go to a deeper level [of teaching] with the students,” Montgomery said.