As our 2025-2026 school year is slowly coming to a close, there is no better time to get to know people who make Starr’s Mill such a great place to learn. This month, we are starting a new spotlight series including all the departments at Starr’s Mill. Those departments include: Math, English, Physical Education, Exceptional Children Services, History, World Language, Fine Arts, CTAE, and Science.
To give students and staff an insightful look, we asked each department a question that would reveal more about their personality. Their responses offer insight into their humor, values, and teaching styles, and all the small details that make up each department.
With so many new employees joining the Starr’s Mill staff this year, this spotlight series is a perfect opportunity to get to know all the staff. It is a perfect way for everyone to connect. This week’s department is history.
Susan King, department chair
“I genuinely love the New Deal era, which would be like the 1930s. It is really the government stepping in and trying to respond to an economic crisis in the nation like we had never done before," King said. "That the same kind of thing gets picked up later in the 1960s with Johnson’s New Deal.”
27 years of teaching experience
Joe Bara
“The collapse of the Roman Empire," Bara said.
"I one day sat down with the World History class and linked all events that are happening today to the collapse of the Roman Empire.”
19 years of teaching experience
Aaron Buck
“[My] favorite time period to teach is the Cold War, 1945-1988," Buck said. "There was just so much going on.”
25 years of teaching experience
Mark DeCourcy
“Because what we do in here is like shifting graphs and all of that kind of stuff, it would have to be like, coming in and out of like recessions, so maybe like the recession of 2008," DeCourcy said.
33 years of teaching experience
Sean Hickey
“The ancient Romans, because they created so much of our present foundational material for civilizations," Hickey said. "Also the Middle Ages, because it is such a cultural touchstone of the different structures of society, and it is just very eye-catching with the different divisions, the knights, the nobility, and of course the peasants. It sticks in the minds of the students.”
20 years of teaching experience
Quin McConathy
“I think what we are talking about in class right now with the Age of Revolutions," McConathy said. "It's most significant for [the students] to realize that the people can control the government.
It's not just one ruler or absolute ruler or a monarch or a king. The people can take power in the government, and that still inspires people today to take over governments.”
1st year teaching at Starr's Mill
Josh Reeves
“I really like teaching about Civil Rights and the Cold War," Reeves said. "I think [the students] are very locked into the topics. When you talk about the Cold War and the threat of communism, and I just tell them that the threat of terrorism is kind of the same concepts. The way that we talk about terrorism now is the way we talked about communism in the 1950s.”
20 years of teaching experience
Rebecca Rickeard
“When I’m teaching world history, my favorite [time period to teach] is absolutely World War I," Rickeard said. "It’s such a pivotal war. It sets the stage for everything that happens coming after it, World War II, Cold War, Vietnam, all of that. Those conflicts can be traced back to World War I.”
27 years of teaching experience
Diane Ruane
“My favorite thing to teach is the Constitution because of the structure of government we're living under," Ruane said. "It interacts with what's going on in the world.”
18 years of teaching experience
John Steiner
“The French Revolution, just because of how chaotic the time period was in just a short period of time, and how quickly things changed with all of the chaos and fighting and turmoil going on," Steiner said. "The Mongols are also very interesting with Genghis Khan and how much land they conquered.”
23 years of teaching experience
Taylor Sweeney
“I think World War I or the end of World War II. A lot of people can kind of view them as like one big period," Sweeney said. "There’s a ton of stories, every part of the world is involved. Even though I have two history degrees, I still learn stuff about World War II all the time. It’s interesting and kind of exciting.”
13 years of teaching experience
