Mr. Figueroa is a new teacher at Marco Island Academy, however, he is far from new to the school. He is a proud MIA alumni. He first returned to the school as a substitute, eventually quickly stepping in to fill the role of a more permanent teacher halfway through the year, showing his flexibility and ability to adapt. With this, he quickly became a prominent figure in the school throughout the spring semester, causing his temporary job to shift into a more indefinite one. He explains it as something he “fell into”

Though new to teaching, Mr. Figueroa was introduced as a staff member after earning his history degree at FGCU, with a focus on research. He says that his teaching reflects his academic passions. He also claims that teaching so far has been pretty easy, considering the content has already been taught to him his whole college career. The only challenge he faces is keeping everyone on task, however, he says, “If they get a little distracted, it’s okay as long as they hit their deadlines.”

Having graduated from MIA, he already knew most staff at the school, as most of them came from his graduating class and their surprise and support in seeing him again helped him pursue this career with much more passion. “A lot of my former teachers were excited to see another alumni come back and take on the role of a teacher,” he said.

Mr. Figueroa says that adjusting to a leading role has been a bit of a struggle for him because he has never done anything like this before. He also thinks that others may believe that teaching is a sort of “fallback job.” However, he could not think this is further from the truth. He believes that to be a teacher, you have to be fully committed to the role and helping the children learn.

For Mr. Figueroa, teaching isn’t just something that he does to make money, he does this with the purpose to really impact the kids and make a difference in the world. For him, teaching at MIA is his passion, “I wouldn’t be teaching if it wasn’t here.”