Exciting, determined, abrasive, selfless, thoughtful, loud. These are a few words that could be used to describe one special teacher at Tahoma. If you were wondering who this teacher may be, just walk past room 410 and take a look for yourself. Ms. Tubbs has been teaching at Tahoma for the last five and a half years, but in that short time, she has become almost famous among the halls of our glorious school. Although there are a lot of students who know, and talk about Ms. Tubs, there are also a great number of students who have yet to witness the method of teaching she chooses.
Ms. Tubs teaches American Sign Language (ASL) at Tahoma high school. Some people are curious about what caused her to teach, especially so late in her life. When asked about it, Tubbs stated “I kind of got in to teaching by accident. Up until 2001 I did a lot of different things, but I had to rely on my teaching degree to sub for extra money. After a while, the current ASL teacher at Tahoma got sick and, the school needed to replace her, and I was the only sub who knew ASL, so Mr. Davis hunted me down, and pestered me until I agreed to take the job, and I have never regretted it.“
Tubbs has been interested in ASL since she was young, due to the fact that she had a deaf cousin whom she was very close with. She grew up in Pennsylvania, and is the oldest of 3 siblings. She later moved to Montana where she finished her education, at University of Montana with a degree in education. Eventually Ms. Tubs moved to Washington for economic stability, and she has now lived in Washington for the last twenty-four years. Ms. Tubbs currently lives alone, and when people ask her why she never got married, she just shrugs and says “I have always been too stubborn and strong-willed to have a spouse, that’s why I have my animals.”
Lately, Ms. Tubbs has been living her life exactly as she wants. She spends her days teaching in room 410 at Tahoma High School, and her weekends playing poker at the casino. On her vacations, she goes to Montana where she and her pets have a cabin. Ms. Tubbs also enjoys golf, playing the Wii. She is also known for coaching Special Olympics, girl’s fast-pitch, and girls golf. She also runs the Hands up Club and attends almost all sporting events at THS
She plans on a future of teaching and living her life day by day. “I try to say on this side of the grass and not worry more about the future than I do about today.” says Ms. Tubbs, when asked the question, how much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood, she just smiled and said “a whole lot more than I could.”