Government and economics teacher Katherine Rathon officially graduated from the University of Texas at Austin on Dec. 14, 2024, sharing a date with the Saturday before the first semester’s finals week. Just three weeks later, economics teacher Katherine Rathon stepped into her role at McNeil, replacing a long term substitute teacher. 

“I think most teachers will tell you that the first year is famously the hardest, because you have to kind of create all of your curriculum the way that you want to do it,” Rathon said. “I don’t know that there’s really a substitute for doing it. I think you kind of have to let yourself get thrown in with the wolves, a little bit and hopefully, you’ll make it out.”

Rathon majored in history, a choice inspired by her experience as a child of Belarusian immigrants. Her parents immigrated to the U.S. in 2000, in part due to the corruption within the Belarusian government. 

“I think growing up and visiting there and talking to my family and being really close with them showed me how directly history and government can impact people’s lives,” Rathon said. “I find it really important to make sure that people are aware of the way that those things influence them.”

Rathon’s minor was in the UTeach program, a program aimed at expanding the numbers of highly qualified teachers in public schools. 

“Growing up, the people that impacted me the most were always my teachers,” Rathon said. “They were just the people and the adults in my life that shaped me the most as a human. I would go and hang out in their classes during passing periods or after school, and just go bug them, and [that] really made school a safer place for me, and made me more willing to go.”

Rathon hopes to emulate some of the teachers she grew up around, namely a Mr. Werts, whom she was close with throughout high school.

“The most important thing was that those teachers taught me how to be a better person,” Rathon said. “I don’t remember much from their classes, but talking to them about my life and hearing their advice or whatever they said [was important to me.] I still take a lot of that advice to this day, even from when I was like 11 in sixth grade.”

During her experience in the UTeach program, Rathon worked as a student teacher at numerous schools in both RRISD and AISD.

“The first class that I ever student taught for was for a group of third graders who were learning about units of measurement,” Rathon said. “I remember going up there, even though I had no interest in teaching eight-year-olds and starting to talk. And somehow it just kind of worked, and it felt very instinctual to me. I remember in that moment in my head being like, ‘Oh—this is exactly what I’m supposed to do with my life.’”

For the majority of her time as a student teacher, Rathon taught at Westwood High School, taking over two class periods of U.S. history.

“For my student teaching experience, the most rewarding moment was [during] my last few days of teaching, my students were just so sad that I was leaving, and a lot of them [wrote] me notes,” Rathon said. “One of them was like, ‘I’m gonna try and keep learning in your honor after you leave.’ [Another was] like, ‘You made me actually enjoy history for once.’ Being a person who suddenly makes a class that most students hated be their favorite class is like the best compliment that I could ever get.”

When Rathon made the jump from student teaching to a full-time teacher, she also made the jump from two to six class periods. 

“Teaching six classes is a lot harder,” Rathon said. “I think student teaching definitely helped me, and it kind of got my foot in the door to where now I feel like I have the resources and the knowledge that I need in order to be able to do decently well with six classes, but the workload is not necessarily something I think you can prepare for.”

Despite the challenges of more class periods, Rathon believes she’s “holding her head above water,” and continuously aims to engage students in class.

“[With the sub] all we got was long worksheets and boring online assignments, it just wasn’t fun,” senior Zach Schreppel said. “It’s a lot better now, because Ms. Rathon does interactive lessons and assignments, which actually makes it pretty interesting.”

As the end of the school year draws closer, Rathon hopes to establish herself as a teacher who cares about her students and is passionate about her job. 

“I want to do the most that I can with the time that I have,” Rathon said. “The stronger the relationships I can build in that amount of time, the better. That’s really why I’m here. That’s the best part of the job.”