The shiny glass apple, presented to the 2014 National Teacher of the Year, sits on a bookshelf in Sean McComb’s home in Perry Hall. A photo of McComb receiving the award from President Barack Obama at the White House hangs in his office at school. Keepsakes both, they are reminders of the flashpoint in the educator’s career during those pinch-me moments that recur from time to time.
“It was a wild and wonderful thing that happened,” McComb, 41, said of the accolade. “It’s almost like it happened to another person.”
Eleven years have passed since McComb took honors as America’s top teacher. Then an English instructor at Patapsco High School & Center for the Arts in Dundalk, he spent the following year traveling the world, a symbol of American teaching. He met with educators in Australia and students in England, sharing his tenets and absorbing new ones. On a visit to China, where one city put his picture on billboards, McComb taught a model lesson on poetry.
In hindsight, he said of his journeys, he was as much a sponge as a spokesman.
“I was just a vessel telling a story and reminding people who they are and what they can do,” McComb said. “The gift of that experience was the people whom I met.”
He’s now principal at Lutherville Laboratory Elementary School, a post he has held for four years. Working with younger students, he said, assures them of obtaining the basic skill sets for life. McComb’s mantra, and that of his staff, is that no child shall slip through the cracks.
“If a kid reaches 10th grade and can’t read, it’s hard for a teacher to change that,” McComb said. “My calling was [to start in grade school] and help them build a foundation for reading. I can’t imagine ever doing anything else.”
He’ll not forget that unparalleled week in March 2014 when — in the course of five days — his wife had their first child and he was named the country’s top teacher.
“We were sitting in the living room, with Silas asleep in Sarah’s arms, when the phone rang,” McComb said. “Having two cataclysmic events happen almost simultaneously felt surreal. Then we took our son to the White House [for the presentation]. Sarah was delayed entry at first because Silas didn’t have a Social Security number until they deemed he was not a threat.”
Then the McCombs met the president, who asked to hold their child.
“My mother-in-law, who’s very protective of Silas, asked, ‘Mr. President, do you know what you’re doing?’ ” McComb recalled. “Mr. Obama said, ‘Don’t worry, I’m the baby whisperer,’ and he scooped Silas up and carried him around the East Room.”
It was, McComb said, a singular experience. But neither that moment, nor being thrust into the spotlight for the following year, ever swelled his head.
“I’m not worried about lights and audiences,” he said. “What makes me happy is to be working alongside others who are serving kids every day.”
“Whatever happened to?” is an occasional series following up on individuals who have made news in The Baltimore Sun. Contact Mike Klingaman at [email protected] and 410-332-6456.
