A little more than eight years ago, Brendan Gallagher's career had included researching antidotes to chemical weapons, grad school for molecular biology and running two research labs for a pharmaceutical company.
It was a successful run by any standard, but "at that time I just — something was missing," he said. "I really wanted to teach, and I felt like that's where I would have the biggest impact. It's just something that makes me happy."
Today, Gallagher is happily installed as an instructor in the biomedical science program at the Carroll County Career and Technology Center, and he has done pretty well for himself in his new career track as well: His passion for making the complex world of biology comprehensible has now earned him recognition as Carroll County Public School's Teacher of the Year.
"It's been a wild ride," Gallagher said. "I found out I was a finalist back in March and went through the interview process, and was surprised on Tuesday night when I found out I was Teacher of the Year."
It wasn't such a surprise to his students and colleagues.
"He is very engaging with the students. He is able to get very technical, scientific information down to a level that they can understand and work with," said Tech Center Principal Bill Eckles. "He is also very much a leader among the staff. ... He's one that people go to when they want insight on something to ask, 'How do you think we should handle this?' "
Indira Jetton and Sarah Riggin are both Century High School juniors in their first semester of the biomedical science program, where they are currently learning about the human nervous and endocrine systems. When they return in the fall, as seniors, they'll take on more complex projects including cloning a pumpkin and inserting bioluminescent jellyfish genes into bacteria to make them glow.
"He's really engaging in class and helps you understand — you don't get bored in this class," Riggin said. "I just really enjoy his teaching style."
"He challenges us beyond the curriculum, which is really nice because it gives us different opportunities to learn different things," Jetton added. "He also implements his own experience in labs and things that he has done, and he applies it to our curriculum."
Gallagher's first job after earning a bachelor's degree in molecular biology was working for the Institute of Chemical Defense at Aberdeen Proving Ground. He was tasked with looking at mustard gas in new ways.
"We were looking for compounds that would ameliorate the effects of mustard agent on human cells," he said. "We did a lot of work with cell cultures mixing them with different compounds and adding mustard agent to see if the cytotoxic affects were as bad; looking for ways to protect soldiers and the public against potential chemical attacks."
It was his experience teaching while in graduate school for his master's degree that gave Gallagher the teaching bug, but first he went to work for a pharmaceutical company —General Resonance, which has since been bought out. He managed two labs for General Resonance before the opportunity arose to jump into teaching in Carroll County.
"This position was only offered to internal applicants, but my wife is a teacher, so she found out about it," Gallagher said. "I kept beating down the door until I got an interview. The program is a perfect blend of teaching and research, and I love both. So it's a great mix for me."
It was Gallagher's hire that actually launched the biomedical science program, according to Eckles. The curriculum comes from Project Lead the Way, he said, a national organization that sponsors STEM — science, technology, engineering and mathematics — courses in schools.
"In addition to all the work [Gallagher] has done for us, he has also become a master teacher for Project Lead the Way and works with Stevenson University to actually help them develop curriculum and help them promote the program nationally," Eckles said. "It's not just that we think he's good teacher, across the country they think he's a good teacher."
The biomedical science program has now become so popular, the Tech Center has added a second teacher, according to Eckles.
"We run four sections of it a year, so 88 students through the program," he said. "If we had staffing and space, we could run more — there is so much interest in the program."
One reason for the program's popularity are some of the opportunities Gallagher has brought to the class that go above and beyond the already advanced curriculum provided by Project Lead the Way. After completing two semesters in the class, some seniors have the opportunity to return to work on a more advanced research project: sequencing and cloning genes from American chestnut trees. It's work that can even get students published in academic journals — the currency of an academic career in the sciences — before they graduate high school.
"I think it's a huge boon to our program to be able to offer that to our students being able to come out of high school published," Gallagher said. "What I want for my students is for them to enter into a research lab their freshman year [of college] and just hit the ground running and they are well able to do that."
For Ave Keefer, a Francis Scott Key senior who completed the regular biomedical science program in the fall and has returned to do further research on chestnut tree genetics, Gallagher's class is what allowed her to first envision a career in the sciences.
"I plan to get a biochemistry bachelor's degree and then apply for a six-year program for an MD/Ph.D," she said. "I came into this class having no idea what I wanted to do, so it all kind of followed along with my education here and my growing love of science from this program."
Though the knowledge and experience Gallagher brings to his teaching cannot be denied, Keefer said his skills at instruction transcend the subject matter; that Gallagher could do just as well teaching an English class if he so chose.
"I think it comes a lot from his organization of everything. He understands how to present things to us in a way that we can understand," Keefer said. "It's not just jumping in and dropping it on us, these complicated concepts are introduced to us in a way that makes sense and is logical."
When asked to reflect a bit on his teaching technique, and what he tries to impart to the Project Lead the Way teachers he mentors, Gallagher said it comes down to learning how to communicate and transmit your own enthusiasm for a subject to your students.
"That passion that I have excites the students, and it gets them really motivated to learn. If I can do that well, I am setting them up to be lifelong learners," he said. "If you are then being able to find meaning in what you are doing and motivate yourself, I think that is the key to what I do."
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