June 18, 2008

Auburn School District No. 40

915 4^th Street NE

Auburn, WA 98002

To Whom It May Concern:

I am writing in support of Paul Nelson who is seeking employment with your school district. For the last year, I was Paul’s colleague at the Muckleshoot Tribal College. He worked as an office skills instructor while I worked across the hall as a GED instructor. I had many opportunities to observe his skillful teaching style and inspirational personality, and I was always impressed with his professionalism, expertise, and collegiality.

Paul is an excellent teacher and communicator, and his classroom conduct evidences skills and ease found only in the most experienced instructors. With twenty-six years as a radio broadcaster and over ten years as a poetry instructor, Paul brought a vast and unique array of teaching tools to his office skills position. Paul’s wonderful facility with language, keen awareness of student needs, and ability to make the most mundane office skills a fun learning process are examples of these tools. In addition, he was always prepared if not over-prepared. For all of his classes, which in the last several months were filled over capacity, he prepared PowerPoint presentations as well as online tutorials that were directed to all ability levels and learning styles. That kind of preparation was essential as Paul had students of all ages from vastly different educational backgrounds. Because of his enthusiastic approach, students loved going to Paul’s classes, and they always learned something. Whenever I observed his classes, the students were always fully engaged and often smiling and laughing.

In his tenure at Muckleshoot College, Paul built the office skills program into a popular and successful series of classes, bringing in the most students ever in its history. Some of the reasons for the program’s success include Paul’s flexible scheduling of tutoring and testing sessions, his challenging but fun instruction, his prompt grading of tests and friendly consultations with students, his jovial, yet always professional, manner, and, perhaps, most importantly, his sincere compassion for the Muckleshoot students and the difficulties they face as Native Americans.

Because of his professional, enthusiastic, and friendly demeanor, Paul was an outstanding colleague. In staff meetings, he always articulately reported the news from his program and offered thoughtful insights and analyses for others. He never failed to have a warm greeting in the morning or a friendly farewell in the evening for me and his other colleagues.

I am very pleased to wholeheartedly recommend Paul Nelson as an outstanding prospective teacher for your district. I am available anytime during the day to answer any questions you may have. Thank you for your time and consideration.

Sincerely,

Todd Johnson

GED Instructor

Muckleshoot Tribal College

(253) 876-2136