Get to Know the man Himself, Mr. Frett.

As many of you would know Mr. Frett is a math teacher here at lakes High School, as  well as the boys varsity soccer coach.

Mr. Frett was born in 1967 in St. Jose hospital, raised in Tacoma by Lincoln High School.

I asked Mr. Frett what his childhood was like and the area that he grew up around. As his parents were very religious, while his friends attended public school, Mr. Frett attended catholic school.  Similar life to us when we were younger but without technology, Mr. Frett and his friends would all gather together to hang out.

“there would be 20 of us kids. We drank from the hose, we rode our bikes without our helmets, we would play tag on the corner all together”.

I asked him “from then and now, would you say that Tacoma was a lot safer back then than now”.

“Back then I could walk in the streets without having to worry about my safety, I wouldn’t have to constantly check over my shoulders at night. Today there is a lot more issues and much more stress walking alone.”

Mr. Frett enjoys working in his yard a lot outside of school, He enjoys gardening, he has grown his own herbs, he has built brick walls around his flower beds. Mr. Frett also built his own quid fish pond back in 2020, the moment he would get home everyday from school, he would grab his pickaxe and start to dig the hole again and again, he got an end product of the pond that could hold up to 3,000 gallons of water, designed with one ending being deeper than the other, that way racoons wouldn’t be able to snatch up the fish.

Coming out of High school Mr. Frett has already decided that he was either going to become a chef or a teacher. Starting off Mr. Frett became a chef first.

“I had to work hard 60 hours a week just to make decent money in the kitchen, I would be working 5-12 hours per shifts in that week in that hot kitchen. One day My manager and I got into an argument. some words were exchange back and fourth. I was told to leave and I did, I decided that I was going back to school to become a teacher”.

I followed up with asking Mr. Frett if his family, and friends criticized him for not keeping to one career path and switching between the two.

“Well no. My Mother and Father have always been supportive of me, as long as I’m happy. Actually both of parents were happy that I went back to college, my Father was the happier one, when I announced that I was going back to college to become a math teacher, as my father stated that chefs don’t make much money for the hard and hot hours they worked. I had a lot of friends that were supportive of me throughout my career no matter what, and to this day they still are”.

As a human being there comes flaws in us, we are not perfect, Mr. Frett gave his thoughts on what his flaws were and what are the flaws of the students he has taught in his many years.

“As a teacher I sometimes forget that I’m at a higher level of math than the actual level that I’m teaching. I have to remind myself that everyone is not at the level of math that I am at. I’m teaching lower level students. The flaws that I have noticed from my students that I have taught throughout the years, is participation. There are students in my class who don’t participate, don’t take notes, doing their homework, or even asking questions in class when they don’t understand a problem. If you don’t participate, you won’t be able to pass the class”

We all know that participation is a major or minor part of our lives and depending what we participate in, we can experience new things. As Mr. Frett said “Some of my students don’t do their homework, if you don’t participate and do your work, you won’t make it in the class”.

Mr. Frett loves to travel a lot. Since 2020 Mr. Frett has not traveled as much as before Covid, his last trip was to Barcelona, Spain in December 2019, as someone who has traveled a lot, Mr. Frett would have seen amazing and beautiful locations with his wife, and obviously there would be favorite spots. ” I would have to say my favourite spots would have to be the city of Prague in the Czech Republic. The saint Charles bridge was built in the 1300s as so the other many buildings are that old, during WWII no one bombed the city at all, it’s a incredible city to be in, It’s beautiful. If I was able to quit my job and liver there for there for he rest of my life, I would be happy”

Thank you again to Mr. Frett for talking to me about him, it was an amazing conversation to have with him.