Tina Czaplinska Staff Writer There is an old Ray Parker Jr. song that goes a little something like “If there’s something strange in your neighborhood/Who you gonna call/If there’s something weird and it don’t look good/Who you gonna call,” and it is the first thing that comes to mind when I think of Mr. O’Toole. A little cliché, I realize, but if you think about it he really is the ‘go to guy’ at Latin. And despite the fact that it widely assumed that Mr. O’Toole is a very busy man, I don’t think many people really know what he does. Well, at least I wasn’t, so I decided to find out. Mr. O’Toole does a lot. He helps seniors with their transcripts and states, “It is my job to accurately represent the student’s achievements at Latin on their transcripts.” On top of teaching an English elective, Mr. O’Toole also appeases six hundred sixty kids altogether, each with an individually crafted schedule (on top of a list of demands). Besides actually assigning all the blocks to all the students, Mr. O’Toole created the layout for how our schedule works. The long blocks being in alphabetical order, the skipping of a class every four days, and all the other meticulous planning all came from him. And while I find the task completely undoable, Mr. O’Toole disagrees and even manages to stay organized. Granted, he has computer software that aids him with keeping schedules in order, but Mr. O’Toole also has a very good system of stacks of paper. Although he does say that he is not nearly as organized in his personal life. Another big part of scheduling is the requests. During add/drop period alone, Mr. O’Toole receives about 1,000 e-mails and 200 phone calls (which he, mind you, has to keep track of). Requests vary depending on the student, but more or less have the same message: I want to be in this class. A major pet peeve of Mr. O’Toole is when people ask him to make a change in their schedule outside of his office. If it isn’t written down, he will most likely forget, so always shoot him an email. And finally, Mr. O’Toole also has notoriety for Hilary Clinton. The life size cut out still kind of freaks me out whenever I am in the office. She is a gift from Mr. Giosh, Mr. O’Toole’s office roomie, whose cousin is a personal friend of the actual Hilary Clinton. So while it may take you a while to remember what class corresponds to what block, keep in mind that you only have one schedule to deal with. Without Hilary Clinton looking over your shoulder. So, really, Mr. O’Toole does it all. Except for teacher requests.]]>
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The Man Behind Hilary Clinton: Mr. O’Toole
October 31, 2010
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gsimon • Nov 16, 2010 at 10:40 pm
Uncle Brendan is a great man! Nuf’ said
akoungou • Nov 3, 2010 at 10:30 pm
I agree with Hedy (:
ty piszesz dobrze
and I think you guys are too underrated.
Hedy • Oct 31, 2010 at 9:32 pm
This is so interesting! I never realized how much Mr. O’Toole really did – and I’ve always wondered about that Hillary Clinton…
Nice article, Tina!
jbucciero11 • Oct 31, 2010 at 9:05 pm
Ok… is misattributing the Ghostbusters song to The Rasmus a joke that I don’t get or an oversight that it was originally by Ray Parker, Jr? I don’t mean to be obnoxious, but if it’s a joke I’d like someone to explain it to me because it has potential to be funny I think.