In 35 years in education at McNary High School, Dan Borresen has filled many roles.
He started as an English teacher and served as a coach in several sports, athletic director and finally assistant principal.
Borresen reflected on his career in an interview after he was given the Service to Education award by the Keizer Chamber of Commerce in January.
He believes teamwork rather than individual effort is the source of his accomplishment.
But McNary Principal Scott Gragg said Borresen’s compassion for his students is the true reason he received the award. He nominated Borresen for the honor.
“Dan was a known leader in the building. He was one of the best, if not the best, teacher at McNary,” Gragg said. “He was well respected. The magic behind Dan is that he had worked with the most difficult students and been successful.”
Gragg said that Borresen “really influenced in a positive way our culture here – how we treated students, how we help students be successful, even when their life circumstances created barriers for them to be successful at school.
Borresen’s empathy for his students trace to from his own childhood experiences growing up in Sweet Home.
Borresen credits his teachers there with his success today, but his story isn’t the standard of a teacher inspiring his choice of career. According to the award winner, those teachers saved his life.
“My mom was so abusive, and she had had a tough life and didn’t know any better and didn’t know what to do,” he said. “I was born to her when she was 16, almost 17, and I was her second kid.”
“I can remember teachers being very compassionate and trying to take care of me and protect me from my mom as much as they could. I missed parts of second grade because I was being hidden from my mother, who was trying to find us and the teachers all knew what I was going through. They couldn’t do a whole lot, but they knew, and they tried,” Borresen said.
He was moved between foster homes and then back to his mother until he was in the third grade when his biological father was awarded custody of him and his siblings. His respite was short lived, and he once again found himself in an abusive home.
“My dad remarried. It was another really rough family situation just because of who he married, and that was difficult and complex, but teachers, again, knew what was going on and kind of protected me and took care of me,” Borresen said.
His elementary school principal got him involved in football, basketball and track and gave him rides home after practice. Everything he needed to play sports, including new athletic shoes, was taken care of by someone at the school. Most often he didn’t know who was behind these kindnesses.
“He got me involved in sports, and that will eventually, in my life, be kind of a saver of my soul,” Borresen said.
His teachers and coaches kept him involved in sports though middle school and on to high school. He had been a sickly, thin and unhealthy child due to neglect, but their efforts ensured he had enough to eat and to grow. He went from being a skinny little boy with no strength to a healthy teenager.
His stepmother’s abusive behavior forced him to leave home at 17. He lived with teachers and friends until he was taken in by a local family. The mom had been the secretary at his elementary school and had taken care of him there. He stayed with her family for the rest of high school.
According to Borresen, living in a stable and caring home helped him graduate from high school and go on to college.
He started out at Willamette University because his original goal was to be an attorney. The university provided him with financial aid so he could play football, but it wasn’t enough, and he had to work to cover costs.
“I worked all the time. I fought fire in the summers. I had a good summer job to help me get through school, but at Willamette I needed a job during the year. I got a job at the local Boys and Girls Club.”
This job changed his life, Borresen said. He was hired as an arts and crafts teacher but was soon given the opportunity to coach the club’s second-grade basketball team.
“I realized I really like helping kids. I started to feel the need to pay back all the teachers and coaches who had been there. I started to feel like I needed to make a shift,” he said.
Borresen transferred to Western Oregon University and changed his major to English.
He credits the difficulties he endured during childhood with his success as a teacher.
“I’m very fortunate to have lived the life I did when I was younger, because it gave me empathy and allowed me to understand. I may not have had many strengths, but I think my biggest strength was that I understood where students were coming from, especially those students that were dealing with challenges in their lives,” he said.
Borreson advises anyone who is considering teaching as a career to take a good look at all that goes into being a teacher. The only reason a person should teach, in the classroom or on the field, according to Borresen, is because that individual wants to help kids.
And he means all kids, from those who are struggling and difficult to those who excel academically.
That said, according to Borresen the majority of people who end up teaching are there for the right reasons.
“I would argue most people in the educational profession are doing it because they care about kids and they want kids to have an opportunity to become useful adults and helpful, loving and caring people with their families and the world that they work in,” he said.
“All those educators deserve a ton of respect for what they’re trying to do, because it is difficult, complex, challenging, but I will also tell you, it’s incredibly rewarding,” he said.
Borresen’s leadership and presence will be missed at the school, according to Gragg, but he has had a significant and lasting impact on the way McNary functions.
One of Gragg’s favorite stories about Borresen involves a famous movie.
“He’s a movie buff. He’s an action movie guy. He loves movies with Mel Gibson or Sylvester Stallone and old Westerns. He’s kind of an old cowboy.”
Gragg recalled a staff meeting where Borresen shared his philosophy about behavior and discipline within McNary. To make his point, he showed a segment from the movie “Road House,” starring Patrick Swayze as a bouncer in a rough bar. The point: Be nice.
“That just encapsulates who Dan is and not only how he treats other people, but how he led, and how he worked with kids in the classroom,” Gragg said.
Retired last year, Borresen plans to immerse himself in favorite activities he didn’t have time to do before.
“I’m an outdoorsman. I like to be outside a lot. I hunt, fish, hike and kayak. I’m getting to do those things during the week, when before I never could,” he said. “I’ve been reading and writing for my own enjoyment, those have been nice things, too. I want to travel. I might work again eventually.”
Teaching at McNary was a privilege, Borresen said.
“I was honored to work and teach with my colleagues, the Keizer community, and most of all, to work with all the students,” he said. “I’m hopeful I helped at least a couple in my long time of teaching. I hope I had some type of positive influence, because I know for me, my educators probably saved my life. They sure got me going down a more positive path than the one I was on.”
Note: This is part of a series of articles about award-winners from the Keizer Chamber of Commerce banquet in January.
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