Meet Julia Schwartz and Mr. Amit Gupta _   

Julia Mroz ’16, Editor

For most of us, when we left for Winter Break, we knew we’d have time off from school or work to relax and spend time with family. Mrs. Schwartz left for break knowing that she would soon have another family member and that her break would be longer than most. On December 27th at 1:10 in the afternoon, Julia Elizabeth Schwartz, weighing seven pounds, five ounces and measuring twenty-one inches. Julia joins her thirteen month old big sister Abby. Although Abby was very suspicious of her new little sister at first, she has become a great big sister. Now, whenever Abby sees her sister she points and says “Jule!” According to Mrs. Schwartz, “[Abby] is a great big sisters and I’m hopeful that they will be the best of friends!”

The birth of her daughter is one of two big changes for the Schwartz family this winter. On March 14th (Pi-Day for all you math geeks) she will finish the process of buying her new house.  While on maternity leave, Mrs. Schwartz plans to spend time with her daughters and to expose them to sports early. Her husband coaches baseball and she plans to bring the girls to the games.

While Mrs. Schwartz enjoys time with her husband and daughters, her classes must continue. Mr. Amit Gupta, a teacher at Burlington County College, has been hired to fill in for Mrs. Schwartz. He will be teaching all of her classes, AP Calculus AB, Accelerated Probability and Statistics, and Advanced Algebra II. While at home, Mrs. Schwartz has no worries about her classes.  She is confident in Mr. Gupta’s ability to teach her classes because of his “excellent qualifications” and because she feels that his personality will be a good match for Haddonfield students. Before leaving for maternity leave, Mrs. Schwartz ensured that she left detailed lesson plans and assessments for Mr. Gupta to use.

Students in all three  of the subjects are currently in preparation for midterm exams, and students in the AP Calculus class  are continuing to prepare for the AP test in May. Mrs. Schwartz will return in April, in time to prepare her calculus class for the exam, but Mr. Gupta will teach students much of the material they need to know for the exam. According to one member of the calculus class who wishes to remain anonymous, “I’m worried for the AP test, but not because of Mr. Gupta, more because of the test itself”. The AP test itself is stressful enough, without worrying about changing teachers. However, Mr. Gupta and Mrs. Schwartz have coordinated to ensure that the change is as seamless as possible and that students will be well-prepared for the exam in May.

Although many students miss Mrs. Schwartz, students are also enjoying working with Mr. Gupta as they learn different ways of approaching problems and become accustomed to different teaching styles. Mr. Gupta is doing a phenomenal job of filling in for Mrs. Schwartz, which is no easy feat.