Ms. Tessa Tryon teaches ninth grade physical education at West Potomac. She has been teaching for a total of 14 years. Three in the Pennsylvania area, another three at Mount Vernon and eight at West Potomac.

 After high school, Ms. Tryon did not know for certain what career she wanted to pursue. Becoming a ninth grade PE teacher, however, was something she never had thought of before entering college. Ms.Tryon attended West Chester University in Pennsylvania where she studied kinesiology, the study of the human body movement. It wasn’t until her sophomore year of college when she realized what she wanted to do.

“It was a long winding journey for me,” Ms. Tryon said. “I don’t think I knew what I wanted to do, but I knew I had a passion for sports. I feel like I learned a lot from sports and I knew that I kind of wanted to go in that direction.”

 Ms. Tryon stumbled upon teaching through coaching opportunities. She figured she would be a good teacher, and out of interest, she started taking teaching courses. She ended up really liking it, and decided to pursue sports education. In order to be a PE teacher, she had to double-major. It was required that she get a health and PE degree along with a teaching degree.

“You learn a lot from sports. You learn a lot about teamwork, cooperation, and trust. These are life skills that are really exclusive to PE classes that you don’t get broadly across the spectrum at this school,” said Tryon.

 Ms. Tryon loves working here at West Po. She loves the environment and being able to teach ninth graders. Before she came to West Po, she had developed connections with others who were already working here. She was excited to start working with her friends again.

“The energy is different in here. When kids come in here they want to have fun, they want to be silly and socialize. When you are able to hone that in the right way, it is a really enjoyable class for everyone, including me,” she said.