NCSSM-Morganton math teacher Terrence Ancrum's story of how he came to the school will not be topped anytime soon at faculty gatherings. (photo: Emily Cunard)
This week sees the third in a four-part series highlighting the experiences so far of faculty and students new to NCSSM. Meet Terrence Ancrum, a math teacher at NCSSM-Morganton.
Something dreamed about
For Brooklyn-born, first-year NCSSM-Morganton math teacher Terrence Ancrum, his first couple of months at NCSSM-Morganton have been “unreal.” It started with a middle-of-the-night vision while teaching math at UNC-Charlotte. “I had been thinking about returning to the high school classroom,” Ancrum says, “and I’m telling you, I woke up out of my sleep one night with this vague, general vision of a really good high school in my mind.”
Ancrum was already acquainted with NCSSM, having worked with students at a NCSSM-Durham hosted Mathcounts competition, so inspired by his vision, he visited the school’s website. He’d had no idea there was a Morganton campus, or that they were hiring a math teacher, until he’d jumped online. It all seemed, then and now, providential.
And despite a previous awareness of the school’s stellar reputation, Ancrum is still astonished by what he has found in Morganton.
“The culture here and the way that things are done, the format, the students, just everything, this is the school that I envisioned that night,” he says. “I didn’t know this place already existed. This really is something that I dreamed about, and every time I come here, no matter how I might have been feeling on my drive here, a peace just comes over me as soon as I step onto this campus and I see these people.”
All interviews in this series were conducted prior to Hurricane Helene and its devastating effects on Western North Carolina. Our thoughts continue to be with those who have suffered so greatly in its aftermath.
