By: Savannah Shepherd ’20

Mr. Chapman is a well known and well liked Social Studies teacher who is in his 20th year of teaching at Westborough High School.  Let’s learn a little more about how Mr. Chapman came to teach at WHS.

Mr. Chapman grew up in North Attleboro, MA, where as a youth he played baseball throughout middle school.  However, his real love was football. He played in high school and continued his football career in college.

He attended College of the Holy Cross and became a Crusader in the mid nineties. He further discovered at the end of his junior year that he wanted to teach.

He began as a substitute at elementary schools while he was interviewing for a full-time job.

Mr. Chapman says, “I would put together applications to send to every school around me, even if I hadn’t heard of them.”

Did you guess that he had never heard of Westborough High School? His father was friends with the athletic director at the time and made sure he applied here, therefore he could put in a good word, but Mr. Chapman was already attracted to the school at this point regardless of the recommendation help from his father, and he is forever grateful he sent in his application.

He  was hired and planned on starting in 1999, but something concerned him. Hasting’s Elementary School was in the news for their toxic air quality harming the town residents, and more importantly the children, which terrified Mr. Chapman. Thankfully, he still chose to begin his long, rewarding career in Westborough.

At first, he taught an array of classes ranging from freshman history to sophomore history to even one year of an economics class. He currently teaches sophomore U.S. History and Sociology, a senior elective.

Mr. Chapman recently explained why Sociology is an interesting course to teach.

“The subjects we talk about aren’t commonly brought attention to, along with the classmates making it a great class to be a part of. The seniors are far more mature (in some cases) than, say, freshman, with their expanding life experiences playing a part in understanding the course too,” comments Mr. Chapman.

All in all, Mr. Chapman loves being a part of the WHS staff and community where he finds each day is new, fun, and rewarding. He takes pride in the fact that after all this time, he still recalls his first year in this town, along with vivid memories of students each and every year. After a whopping twenty years, this intelligent man shares this to be the reason he’s never switched his teaching to another high school.