Roberta Schreiner teaches history and social studies at Manhattan Beach Middle School. Last week she was honored at a school board meeting for teaching in the district for fifty years.
Roberta Schreiner once told one of her middle school classes that if they ever have the opportunity to travel it will change their lives.
A boy in the classroom shot his hand up immediately. He told her that his parents—who were both doctors—had taken him with them when they worked at a clinic in Guatemala.
“It changes your life, doesn’t it?” Schreiner said. “And it makes you richer.”
Schreiner said she was impressed with the way the children in her class nodded knowingly at that statement.
“And none of them said, ‘Really? Money?’ They all got it, that you understand something,” she said.
Schreiner, who was honored at a school board meeting last week for teaching at Manhattan Beach Middle School for fifty years, said that discussing world events and travel destinations with her students is in large part what has kept her in the field.
She said she has written the names of an estimated ten thousand students in her rosters over the years. She has seen seven district superintendents come and go, and she has worked with eight different principals.
“And here I am,” she said when she was honored by the district school board for her years of service. “It’s been amazing. I’ve loved every part of the adventure.”
Schreiner, who often goes by “Ro” among friends and colleagues, teaches social sciences and history at Manhattan Beach Middle School, which was called Begg’s Middle School when she first began teaching. The district first hired her in 1962, when she and three of her friends from UC Santa Barbara applied for jobs in the beach cities together.
“Everywhere we went we all got jobs, because that’s how easy it was in those days,” Schreiner said. “Now seventy people apply for one job.”
Although she has remained friends with many of the people she began her teaching career with, she said that she is the only one of them left in the district—several of her former colleagues quit teaching after getting married or have moved.
Technology has also changed over the years, with the students of Manhattan Beach Middle School now using iPads in the classroom on a daily basis.
“The kids are really good at it,” she said and laughed. “One of our counselors has a daughter who’s one and a half and she just zips around on it.”
Although the technology is new to her, Schreiner said she likes change, and that she’s adapted her lesson plans to the new technology.
Principal John Jackson said that he appreciates Schreiner’s extensive background in teaching over the years.
“You’ll say, ‘Hey, does that work?’ And she’ll say, ‘Eh, back in ’72 we tried that,’” he said.
In her vacation time away from school, Schreiner said she takes every opportunity she can to travel. Schreiner has been to Nigeria, Ghana, Egypt, China, Japan, Mexico, Ecuador, Peru, Guatemala and “all over Europe.”
Because her class focuses heavily on world issues, geography and medieval history, she said she is able to bring a broader context of the lessons into the classroom from her travels.
Images of medieval castles in Europe cover almost an entire wall in her classroom.
“The world is so big and if I’ve been somewhere once, now I have three more places I haven’t gone,” Schreiner said.
Most recently she went to Japan as a chaperone for Mira Costa High School students. She said they went to Toyota Town, the stock exchange, multiple shrines and that they got to witness a Shinto wedding “on accident.”
“It can’t get better than that,” Schreiner said.
“I keep going because it’s the perfect job,” she added.
Schreiner projected an image of a map of the world in her classroom as her students took a practice quiz for a geography test on their iPads. The room filled with the softened clicking sounds of the children typing on touch screens.
The students located the Mediterranean Sea and the Prime Meridian on the map. They burst out laughing at a boy who enthusiastically raised his hand and said he could spell “Prime Meridian,” then quickly paused and said, “Oh wait—” while staring down at his iPad perplexed.
“It’s fine,” Schreiner said. “You’re brave for trying.”
“My goal each day is to make the class laugh at least once,” she said.
Schreiner also teaches a leadership class for students involved in community service, such as working for the food pantry, Project Needs, or The Friendship Circle, an organization for special needs children.
Jackson said that Schreiner always has a positive outlook.
“I always think, ‘What would Ro do?’” Jackson said. “I’ve never seen Ro get upset about anything; she’s never flustered about anything. I’ve never heard her say something negative about anybody and that’s always something I strive for.”
When she was honored at last week’s school board meeting, Schreiner was given a lei, multiple bouquets of flowers and some potted cacti. Carolyn Seaton, executive director of educational services for the district, gave a speech reciting headline news that occurred in 1962, the year Schreiner was first hired by the district. The Beatles had released their first single, “Love Me Do,” Andy Warhol premiered his Campbell’s Soup Cans exhibit in Los Angeles, President John F. Kennedy announced in a speech at Rice University that the U.S. would put a man on the moon by the end of the decade, and—garnering a laugh from the audience at the meeting—MBUSD superintendent Michael Matthews was born.
“Think about a teacher who’s been teaching with that kind of diligence in her fiftieth year,” Schreiner’s husband, Chuck, said at the ceremony. “What time do you think she gets up to prepare for a day of teaching? Five a.m. It’s a five minute drive to school. My god, who is this woman? She radiates joy.”
“I’ve loved everything I’ve done,” Schreiner said. “This honor is unimaginable. Thank you for trusting me with your children.” ER
