His Story
Joel Truesdell was a graduate student in organic chemistry at the University of Hawaii in 1987 when he took a substitute teaching job at Kamehameha Schools in Honolulu to help pay his way. “Before long, I realized that I absolutely loved being a high school teacher much more than being a research scientist.” He holds a chemistry degree and a master’s in organic chemistry from the University of Miami, and he built his teaching on the model of his first- and fifth-grade teacher in Lewiston, New York, Dorothy Mt. Pleasant Crouse, whose hands-on lessons he can still remember “57 years later.”
He taught mathematics and chemistry at Kamehameha’s Oahu campus from 1987 to 2004 and then chemistry at its Hawaii campus until retiring in 2021, including honors and AP chemistry. He won the Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching in 2002 and the NSTA Shell Science Teaching Award in 2017. In 2021-22 he was an Albert Einstein Distinguished Educator Fellow with the U.S. Geological Survey at the Department of the Interior, and he was a National Teachers Hall of Fame finalist in 2022. His principal describes him as a science teacher at the school for over 35 years.
Beyond the Classroom
For more than 25 years Truesdell coached girls cross country, bringing home six second-place trophies from the state championships. His teams took annual trips to California or Arizona for large invitationals and college visits, and he led the fundraising to keep the trips affordable. A parent who served as his team coordinator recalls him tutoring runners in math during overnight trips. He also founded a summer science institute in Hawaiian medicinal plants in 1991 and a PSAT preparation team in 1990, and a former head of school credits his PSAT course with doubling the school’s National Merit recognition rate.
Truesdell has given ten presentations at NSTA national conventions and many more at regional, national and international education conferences, and he has served as co-chair of a College Board student advocacy conference. During his fellowship he designed and directed a six-day summer science camp for eighth graders in Tuba City, Arizona, run with USGS scientists, which ended with a rafting trip on the Colorado River. Students wrote plans for their own success and letters to the Secretary of the Interior about climate change.
Philosophy Into Practice
Truesdell teaches in an indoor chemistry lab and an outdoor classroom. In 2012 he started a native forest restoration project at the school where students pot koa seedlings, record growth, pH, rainfall and fertilizer data, and graph the results, and where families help tend the forest on weekends. Thirteen of his labs are tied to Hawaiian culture and place, and every lab ends with students proposing a better apparatus or a comparison with another culture’s approach. Students begin by interviewing the elders in their lives, and during the exploration phase computers and phones are put away.
He measures his results with the American Chemical Society exam. His students’ average score rose from 70% in 2010-11 to 88% in 2018-19, and from 2012-13 on a large majority of his students scored above the national average. When the pandemic closed campuses he secured a free pilot of Cisco Presenter Track, a two-camera classroom system that let remote and in-person students work as lab partners, and he met worried students and families on empty campus weekends. He says his students were excited to return, and that “outstanding teachers will always find a way to adapt!”
“The first of the three statements at the core of his teaching philosophy: “I believe that all students will be successful in my classroom.””Joel Truesdell
In His Own Words
“I believe that it is not what you teach but how you teach that determines success.”Joel Truesdell
“My first message always is that ALL students can succeed.”Joel Truesdell
“These methods work for all students!”Joel Truesdell
What Others Said
“He produced problem-solvers and critical thinkers in his classroom.”Dr. Lehua M. Veincent, principal, Kamehameha Schools Hawaii High School
“Mr. Truesdell exemplifies the definition of not just a good teacher, but an absolute great teacher.”Parent of two former students
“It has been an honor to witness the dynamic genius of Mr. Joel Truesdell as an educator and professional development facilitator”Colleague and fellow Albert Einstein Distinguished Educator Fellow alum