EF Educational Tours is looking for teachers who go above and beyond for their students, and they need your help.

My seventh grade teacher, Mr. Rowe was the best teacher I ever had. I know this because the seventh grade was the year I went from feeling a general sense of lethargy and apathy towards every single one of my classes, to a genuine and sincere interest in history, science and literature.

This is the lamest compliment I can give (and I’m laughing at myself as I write this), but it’s completely true when I say that Mr. Rowe made learning fun.

His lectures were practically a one man show. All theatrics and pantomime. He didn’t explain things as a matter of fact, he told you a story. In retrospect, that was probably the year I began to love storytelling as an art form.

Mr. Rowe went a little further than just make class not suck. He made us care about our work.

He didn’t fail anyone. But he held us all to really high standards, often making us do assignments multiple times if we were continually unsuccessful. You either crushed your assignments or tests, or you had to do it again. B’s and C’s weren’t really a thing.

And you’ve got to understand, my friends and I were the bad kids. Well, as bad as you can be in elementary school. We got suspended for swearing at teachers and were regularly chased off the roofs of portables on afternoons and weekends (we would try to ollie the gaps on skateboards).

But Mr. Rowe got us to a point where we were competing with each other for the best test score, the best project, the best essay.

I’ve had great teachers since Mr. Rowe. My eighth grade teacher was stellar; he taught me how to play bass, and hipped me to the all best comic books. I had an auto shop teacher in high school who taught me how to disassemble Corvette engines. My teachers at Vancouver Film School all became trusted mentors, and then friends and peers.

I would nominate any one of them to win EF Beyond the Classroom.

EF Educational Tours is looking for teachers who go above and beyond for their students, and they need your help.

Does your teacher host your favourite after-school program? Organize the best field trips? Or maybe just make class more interesting than it’s ever been? Are they determined to put you on the right path?

A panel of judges will choose one deserving teacher to win a professional development trip abroad. The student who nominated them will win a prize pack worth $1,000, including an iPad Air 2 and accessories!

Update: the contest is now closed. Check the blog for more current chances to win!