Following his time at Andover as both a student and teaching fellow, Howard Kalter ’07 rejoined the Andover community this year as an Instructor in Mathematics, Statistics, and Computer Science, as well as as the Head Coach for Andover Boys Varsity Water Polo. Beyond the classroom, Kalter enjoys hiking, backpacking, rock climbing, and fly fishing.
There are many reasons. As a student and a teaching fellow, I had amazing experiences in this community, and worked with some amazing colleagues. I’m really excited to further my experiences as a teacher and a coach here. It’s just a great place with so many happy memories.
The schedule––that’s a big change. [Before], you had three 45 [minute periods] a week and one 75 [minute period] with each class… I guess I haven’t really taught a long class yet, because we’ve had just these short periods, but I do like the new schedule. The new facilities are amazing, too. I’m really excited to coach in the new pool soon and the Snyder Center is beautiful. Some teachers have phased out and retired, but there [are] still a lot of teachers that are here, so it’s something that stayed the same that I’m really excited about.
It was probably the amazing teachers I had at [Andover]. I think I was always drawn to math because it made sense to me and I, as much as a high school student can enjoy it, enjoyed [it]. It was similar in college; I just gravitated toward math classes because it was interesting and wasn’t as hard as some of my other classes I was taking. It just kind of made sense.
Try to take advantage of as many parts of Andover’s community, curriculum, residential offerings, and extracurricular offerings as you possibly can. It’s a very unique place that offers things that you won’t see in many other high schools and [even] some universities…. Just take part in as many different things as you can.
I am more interested in applied math than theoretical math, and so in the field of applied math, I think linear algebra is interesting. It is so useful in many industries and a lot of data science and things like that. It’s a very powerful tool.
As a student, I would say my favorite area on campus was Pine Knoll because that [was] where I lived, and we had a lot of fun there. Now, I think my new favorite area will be the pool [in the Pan Athletic Center] when it’s finished. I [also] like Paresky [Commons. It’s] a nice area. That’s another thing that’s changed a lot since I was a student.
I haven’t gotten to try that many yet. I’ve been gravitating towards pizza. The Hearth options have been pretty good. I’ve been trying those a lot.
It’s really just problem-solving strategies and skills, so trying to look at it from a different angle [and] trying to use what you’ve done in previous problems to apply that skill or those techniques to the new problem. Then, if all that fails, seeking help. It’s okay to seek help from peers, tutors, or from math teachers.
The most important lesson I’ve learned from my students is that there [are] many different perspectives in mathematics, and the more you can become aware of and understand, the easier it is to communicate with each other.
Andover/Exeter weekend was really fun, [but] spirit week beforehand was my favorite, because there used to be… Exeter Geek Day. That was one of my favorite events, because my friends and I would really dress up. We went all out for that event; we had a lot of fun dressing up and running around campus being silly. I really liked that.
