Swampscott teacher named Nobel Educator of Distinction

SWAMPSCOTT – In less than a decade, Mark Schwartz has progressed from teacher’s aide to Nobel-winning academic. Well, sort of?”I don’t get the million-dollar prize,” joked Schwartz, a Swampscott High history teacher and member of the SHS Class of 1995 who was named a Claes Nobel Educator of Distinction last week. “If I did, then maybe I’d refer to myself as Nobel Prize winner.”The Educator of Distinction award is given by the The National Society of High School Scholars and is named in honor of the society’s founder Claes Nobel, a relative of Peace Prize namesake Alfred Nobel. According to the society’s Director of University Relations, Yun Mi Yi, the program began in 2004 to recognize the contributions of teachers to students’ achievements. There are currently over 30,000 Educators of Distinction. They must be nominated for the prize by a student whose grades qualify them to be a member of the society.Senior and society member Alexander Billias nominated Schwartz for the prize this fall, citing Schwartz’s Advanced Placement United States History class that Billias took as a junior.”It was Mr. Schwartz’s first time teaching and it was a lot of work with both classroom and independent work,” said Billias, explaining that this was an effective way to handle the immense amount of material covered in the class. Schwartz said that students must understand events occurring from pre-Columbian America to the first week in May when they take the exam.But the students did well, Schwartz said. All of the 19 students passed the test and nine or 10 scored a 4-out-of-5 on the test.”We didn’t have any 5s, but we were right on the border. We’ll accept that,” Schwartz said.Schwartz said he was completely shocked by the award and thanked his fellow teachers for helping him in the classroom.”I thank them for all the help they gave me,” said Schwartz. “Every teacher takes from other teachers and I do share this with them – they helped me a lot.