Preparing the Next Generation of Teachers

Bruce Dewey’s path to becoming an educator began in the restaurant industry. He earned an associate’s degree in restaurant management in 2004 and would spend the next 10-12 years recruiting and training restaurant employees.

Although his early-career experience was not technically part of the teaching degree – Dewey credits it for allowing him to gain the experience of teaching others how to succeed and make the most of a constantly changing world.

A friend later told him about the education program at The Ohio State University at Mansfield and the benefits of lower cost tuition and smaller class size. Dewey found the campus attractive, enrolled for his first semester in 2017, and earned his Bachelor of Science in Education (Middle Childhood) in 2021.

Today, Dewey teaches math and STEM at Lexington Junior High School and is also an associated faculty professor at Ohio State Mansfield, where he teaches “School and Society.”

“I want to prepare my students for the workforce of tomorrow,” he said. “We don’t know what that is necessarily, but I try to give them the skillsets and the problem-solving techniques that they will need, so they can thrive in the future.” 

Dewey also holds a Master of Arts degree in teaching from Western Governors University and is pursuing his doctorate in curriculum studies, with a focus on STEM, from the University of South Carolina.

“I want to continue my education and maximize it to its fullest potential,” he said. “I really enjoy teaching at Ohio State Mansfield and this experience has fired me up to be a better teacher.”

Redmond Wood is a coordinator in the educator preparation program at Ohio State Mansfield and recognized Dewey’s talents early on.

“Everything he did while he was a student here showed me that he was someone who could handle the teaching role,” Wood said. “He’s very organized and focused, well read and he knows his strategies. He’s a complete teacher who really has a sense of where he is and where he wants to be.”

As a non-traditional student, Dewey was 15-20 years older than most of his classmates at Ohio State Mansfield. While that difference was very real, Dewey found himself at home and involved with his classmates in more ways than he expected.

“I actually made some lifelong friends with the younger people who were in my cohort. On the activity side, I helped start a ping-pong club on campus, I played intramural basketball a couple years and I generally found myself engaged with everyone around me,” Dewey said.

Andrew Mueller, director of the Conard Learning Center, said he hired Dewey as a tutor in the CLC and was impressed with how he mentored students and other tutors.

“Although Dewey was a non-traditional student, traditional college-age students never had trouble connecting with him or working with him,” said Mueller. “He worked hard but he also liked to have fun. I often would join him and a few other students over in the Student Union for a lunchtime ping-pong match.”

Dewey received the Faculty and Staff Merit Award in 2019, and was recognized as the top student teacher in his cohort when presented the Book Award by the Education Department faculty, in 2021, and he continues to find new ways to improve his teaching and the impact he has on his students. He is passionate about what he does, and seeing students grow.

“I like the feeling of being able to help people succeed and being the conduit between the knowledge and their learning process,” he said.

Learn more about the Department of Teaching and Learning at The Ohio State University at Mansfield online, or contact Academic Advisor Jeanne Mauriocourt, at mauriocourt.2@osu.edu