Paige Skyrm
Reporter
@pskyrmcourant
While most people would assume that teaching is a big enough responsibility on its own, for Tony Barnett, a physics teacher, it’s only a small fraction of his many obligations. As a reservist, a person who is still serving in the U.S. Navy, Mr. Barnett enjoys finding the perfect balance between being a Company Commander as well as a high school physics teacher.
Officially joining the military at the age of seventeen, Mr. Barnett spent four years at the United States Merchant Marine Academy in King’s Point, New York. “When I was at the Marine Academy I interned with different branches of the service and decided I liked the Navy the best,” Mr. Barnett said. “I actually would’ve gone Marine Corps, but they didn’t have enough boats.”
In 2006, Mr. Barnett was deployed to Iraq as a civil affairs officer. “I was a Navy officer assigned to the army. They used their Civil Affair officers too quickly and became short handed, so what takes an Army officer two years to qualify for took me four months,” he said.
When it was time for Mr. Barnett to switch from active duty in 1999 to the civilian life, he was unsure of the occupation he wanted to pursue. “I spoke to my wife about it and I said, ‘I don’t see myself wearing a suit and I don’t see myself in the corporate world.’” He later realized that he had been training and teaching others his whole life, which drove him to apply for a teaching position.
Because of his experiences with physics in the Navy, Mr. Barnett realized that when he applied for a teaching job, everything the interviewer was asking him connected to his time in the Navy. “All of the questions that she was asking I answered in terms of ship propulsion and how the rudder and propeller work,” he said.
Though teaching physics and being a reservist are completely different occupations, Mr. Barnett finds that the two overlap quite often. When students complain that they’ll never use a skill like vectors after high school, he’ll reply to them and say, “All of this stuff we do in class with vectors I’ve done on a radar. What I teach is actually what I used to do as a full time job.”
The head of the science department, Christian Dockum, believes that Mr. Barnett has a very unique and effective approach to his teaching style. “One of his strengths is that he’s really able to bring the lab component to his Physics classes,” he said. “If you walk by, the students are actually doing an activity as opposed to looking at the lesson on a board.”
Because of the commitment that it takes Mr. Barnett to stay on top of his work, he has learned the importance of time management. “Usually I’m here by 6:30 in the morning, so I try to get as much as I can done before classes,” he said. “During free periods I’m constantly getting things set up or grading.”
With his busy work schedule, Mr. Barnett believes that the best way to have a balanced life is to know what is most important. “Prioritize the needs in your life and realize that you won’t be able to get everything done,” he said. “There will be plenty of time for those things later on.”
Although he’s a pro at staying on top of his responsibilities, Mr. Barnett emphasizes that it is not always easy. “In the reserves, what I used to say is that you’ve found the perfect balance in life when the reserves, your jobs, and your family are all mad at you, because something’s always going to have to suffer,” he said. “It’s a constant give or take.”
Despite the time crunch that Mr. Barnett constantly lives in, his family, his wife in particular, have always been incredibly supportive of him. “I’ve been balancing my careers for 20 years now and she’s an awesome lady,” he said. “Without her I wouldn’t be able to do this or go this far.”
Though Mr. Barnett has a lot on his plate, he succeeds in balancing his responsibilities. “It’s all time management,” he said. “Sometimes I have to get a test graded so I put the Navy work on the back burner, or sometimes everything is put aside because my son has a game. You always have to pick and choose.”
