Lori Oglesbee:
CLASS OF 1980
West Monroe High SchoolClass of 1980
West monroe, LA
McKinney High SchoolClass of 9999
Mckinney, TX
Camden-Fairview High SchoolClass of 1997
Camden, AR
Bearden High SchoolClass of 1990
Bearden, AR
Huttig High SchoolClass of 1987
Huttig, AR
Lori's Story
Life
I am a journalism teacher in McKinney, TX, a suburb north of Dallas. And I still work with the yearbook and travel all over the country with my students and teaching workshops. My parents are still in West Monroe.
I married the most wonderful man Oct. 20, 2007 in a Vegas wedding at The Bellagio. He's a Brit I met in the grocery store through his sister who's son I taught.
No other person has made a greater impact on my life than my high school journalism teacher. Hope Carroll is still the measure of my success as I constantly try to be the person she is and the adviser she was.
Superlatives abound in this story. Biggest, greatest, hardest, happiest. Extremes of high school life played out in my quest to find myself. Let me tell you how it began¿.
The drum cadence, the red, white and blue uniforms, those ponytails to the side. Nothing else meant more to me my sophomore year in high school than making the Rebel Raiders, West Monroe High School¿s drill team. But I didn¿t.
They didn¿t pick me. It was my biggest disappointment in life until that point. My mother -- sick of my weekend of hysterics, tears and wailing -- told me to ¿snap out of it.¿ She taught at West Monroe, so she took matters into her own hands.
¿You will be involved,¿ she told me. ¿You¿re not going to be a nobody for the next two years. You will be on the yearbook staff. I¿ve already spoken with the yearbook adviser, and she¿s agreed to take you.¿
Agreed to take me? What? Had word of my failure spread so quickly? Was I really that pathetic that someone agreed to take me, as if I were some kind of charity case?
I dried my tears, and on Monday morning, trudged into the publications room, picked up an application, filled it out and turned it in. To my surprise, they took me.
¿Welcome to yearbook,¿ said the lady with the glasses that covered half her face and the reassuring voice that let me know others had suffered setbacks and found their home here, ¿I know you¿ll just love it here. Everyone does.¿
I was in. Definitely in. As in, ¿in over your head,¿ As in, ¿in up to your ears.¿ As in, ¿from now on, yearbook is your life,¿ I forgot about ponytails and red, white and blue uniforms and concentrated on dominant elements and consistent internal spacing. Quickly, I became addicted to yearbook. I¿d found my niche. More than that, I¿d found a mentor.
I attended a summer workshop and Hope, my new yearbook adviser, taught one of the classes. ¿You¿re so lucky to have her as an adviser,¿ the other kids told us. ¿She¿s awesome.¿
We knew that, and we were in awe of her. Her quiet demeanor and dry humor were contagious. I adored her and thought how wonderful it would be to be so influential, so competent, so damn popular.
Throughout my junior year, Hope was my confidant, mentor and friend. When all my ¿cool¿ friends told dirty jokes I didn¿t understand, she hustled me into the back of the journalism room and explained them to me in scientific and street terms. She patted me on the back when I was good, kicked me in the seat of the pants when I wasn¿t. Example: for reasons known only to God, I stamped the entire journalism classroom with the yearbook job number stamp. Hope didn¿t scream. She didn¿t turn me over to the principal, didn¿t call my parents. She simply handed me a rag and a box of Comet and told me to get after it. I was embarrassed, but more than that, I was disappointed in myself. Hope had brought me in, trusted me, and I¿d let her down. I was determined never to do it again.
She took us to the Southern Interscholastic Press Association Convention in South Carolina that spring, where Hope was a celebrity. She taught classes. She served on the board. Everyone knew her. We followed her around like baby chicks.
At the end of my junior yea...Expand for more
r, I applied for a couple of editor positions. I didn¿t get either. They went to my two best friends, and I thought, ¿Here we go again. Drill team, all over.¿ But then the announcement came over the public address system: ¿And editor in chief: Lori Oglesbee.¿
I almost fainted. Screaming, I ran out of the history class, into the J-room next door and into Hope¿s arms. I¿d never felt more important, more worthy before or since.
The next year, I signed up to take Journalism I just to have Hope another period of the day. We learned the importance of the First Amendment and the responsibilities that accompany it. We did consumer reports on product claims every Friday. We counted headlines out loud on the board (flitj). We wrote many stories. Lots of them. And I thought journalism was the most wonderful thing in the world.
Early my senior year, Hope took three of us to CSPA, scholastic journalism¿s Mecca. Three goofy, gape-mouthed rubes from Northern Louisiana in the Big Apple. We sat in the same desks, in the same classrooms in the same buildings as the smartest kids in the world, and for a moment we thought, ¿We can do this. This isn¿t entirely out of our league.¿
We watched Sweeney Todd on Broadway, hiked over to Studio 54 and saw the 1979 cast of Saturday Night Live rehearsing in NBC studios. Hope made it all possible. And again, when we fell victim to our immaturity, she kept her cool. When the security guards turned us in for throwing water out the window of our 10th floor hotel room, she let us know she wouldn¿t tolerate such behavior, but I¿m certain she was fighting back a giggle while reprimanding us and sending us on our way to contemplate our misdeeds.
The yearbook we produced that year (1980) still looks pretty good comparatively. The endsheets could win an award today. But Hope helped me with far more than endsheets and division pages. She guided me through my first serious boyfriend. She kept me focused at a time when other temptations lurked. She tolerated my tendency toward sanctimony. My boyfriend was very religious, and at some point, I decided I could not and would not allow rock and roll music to be played near me because it was the instrument of Satan and would send me straight to Hell, where I assumed the drill team members were going.
Hope saved me from all this nonsense.
At the end of my senior year, I examined my career options and thought, ¿I want to teach journalism.¿ Subconsciously, I wanted to be Hope Carroll. I wanted to be as good, as fair, as wise, as competent. As beloved and admired.
Three years later, I began my career in education, teaching across the grassy field from her at the neighboring middle school, and I sought her constant advice, which she offered generously and copiously. I thought how lucky I am to have such a wonderful mentor who knows so much and is willing to share it.
Now as a journalism teacher myself, I realize how lucky I was to have had such a great teacher in my life. Hope Carroll taught a course she so obviously loved to students she loved unconditionally. Her passion and compassion has impacted so many students including four other journalism teachers, numerous journalists and even a cartoonist for Archie comics. She did more in those 20 years in a high school classroom than most teachers can do in 50.
I feel no different today than I did 25 years ago. Every day I realize how lucky I am to have had such a great teacher in my life. Hope has been my teacher, my encyclopedia, my psychologist, my sex counselor, my mentor, and most importantly, my friend. Though miles separate us today, we stay in touch regularly. I love to hear the old stories. I love to hear her describe her latest hobbies and projects. Most of all, I love to hear the voice that has inspired me for so many years.
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