Amaila Nitu Lisaukas is a new Instructor in Chemistry this 2023-2024 school year. Lisauskas grew up in Romania and taught at various independent and public schools before coming to Andover. She is also a complimentary House Counselor in Eaton Cottage, and will coach Indoor Track and Field as well as recreational squash in the spring term.
Could you give us a brief overview on your upbringing and what led up to you being here?
I grew up in Romania [and] moved to the United States when I was 17. This was soon after the revolution happened in Romania and communism fell… We moved to Manchester, New Hampshire [and] I went to Dartmouth College for my undergraduate. I was originally going to go to medical school, [but] when I was a senior in college, I felt like I wasn’t quite ready to go to medical school and needed to find a job… I had been a peer tutor and tutored students before so I was like, “I’ll try teaching.” I got a job at The Peddie School in New Jersey and taught there for four years. After the first year of teaching, I just fell in love with it, I completely gave up the dream of medical school. I decided teaching was a better choice for me. I stuck with it and I’ve loved it ever since. After four years…I taught at Dana Hall School for nine years. I loved it, and I got married. I had kids; I stayed home for a little while with the kids and then I worked at the Reading Memorial High School for four years. I joined their staff right before Covid[-19], so that whole time it was Covid[-19] and online learning and hybrid learning… I’ve lived in Andover for the past 13 years, we have a house here in Andover, so I just heard the position opened up for chemistry. I applied and I got the job.
What is your favorite part about being a teacher?
I think it’s when I explain something in class or we go over something and every once in a while a student will go, “Oh, that’s why that happens.” You know, when you see the moment where they really get it and they can make a connection with what’s happening in their lives and the world around them and they really start to understand something they didn’t before, that’s really my favorite part… The students are amazing here. I could teach all day. It’s so fun; everybody is curious and interested and wants to learn and everybody is so nice.
Why chemistry? Do you have a special connection that makes it important to you?
I always just liked it. There was something about chemistry that I really liked. When I was in Romania I studied it, when I was in college I studied it. I love the experimental part of it, I love how it explains [all the] way down to the molecule — the nitty-grittiness of how things work. That really appeals to me. I considered other sciences when I was in college; I took physics, my major was actually biophysical chemistry, so I did all the sciences. But chemistry, I just kept coming back to it, because sometimes the other sciences were a little too “big picture” and I really liked knowing the small details, down to the molecule.
Do you have a science fun fact that you like?
You know the lead in [a] pencil? That’s not actually lead; it’s graphite, which is a form of carbon. If you were to take all the carbon in a human body, you would have enough graphite to make 9,000 pencils. That’s a lot of pencils.
What advice would you give to students who are interested in teaching or studying chemistry as their career?
I think chemistry can be hard. It can be intimidating. I can’t tell you how many times I hear [when I’m] at a social event and people say “Oh, what do you do?” and I say “I teach chemistry” and their reaction is “Oh that’s so hard, that’s so terrible.” I know it can get intimidating, but I would tell people to stick with it. A lot of times a switch [will] get turned on and it [will] become easy. Things that are difficult — if you stick with them sometimes, they get easier. I’d say don’t give up.
What’s your favorite aspect of Andover so far?
I think I really love it when I look around and I see all the diversity. I learn from my students about where they’re from [because] they’re from so many different places and have such different backgrounds and experiences. I’ve always appreciated that in my life. I love knowing people from different places, learning about different cultures and learning about everybody’s different experiences. This is besides teaching — I love teaching.
What are some things that you like to do in your free time?
I’m a crafter. I love everything crafty. I knit, I crochet, I have a whole yarn wall at my house. I do watercolor painting… I [also] have bees. I’m a beekeeper. It’s been a family tradition for several generations… Now, my husband and my kids are learning from him. I have twelve hives in my house right now, so there’s a lot. My kids are learning a lot about bees: how you take care of them, how you extract the honey, etc. I make a ton of honey, so we make a taffy…and we make these honeycomb crunch candies that I dip in chocolate, [and] all of that stuff is sold at Dovetail downtown. Every week I have to make twelve bags of candy because they keep getting sold… My daughter crochets small bees that they sell over there. We have a love of bees in my family so it takes a lot of my time with crafting and all that.
What’s your favorite part about keeping bees?
I mean, the honey’s pretty good. I think they’re really interesting, the way they communicate, the life of the hive and everything. Basically, the bees send scouts to find places where they can go and collect pollen and food. Then they come back to the hive and do this little dance with their butt. Through this little dance, they tell the other bees what to do to find the food and everything. There’s a ton of really interesting facts if you learn about the bees themselves. I just think it’s cool, it’s interesting, it’s kind of fun. It’s really neat to have your own honey that you collect from the hive — it’s so much better than whatever you get at the store. We eat it with everything, we put it on our strawberries, our pancakes, our cottage cheese. I think it’s become part of my identity. Students laugh at this but usually, I have bee earrings or something bee-related.
Is there anything else about you that you want students to know about?
I lived through the revolution in Romania when communism fell. I lived not very far from Chernobyl when the nuclear plant exploded, so I was exposed to a lot of radiation. I’ve been through a ton of different hard times in my life, but when I look at where I am right now, I think there’s always hope for your life. You never know where your life is going to take you, I never would have thought I would end up here. I’m happy to be here and I think life is an interesting journey, just hang on for the ride.
Do you have any advice for students at Andover?
Work hard, and try not to take life so seriously. You’re in high-stress situations here, people tend to think, “Oh, if I don’t get into this one college…” or, “If I don’t get a 6 on this test…” It becomes overwhelming and it feels like it takes over your life. Try to sort of take a step back and take a little perspective. Even if you don’t get into the college that you want or you don’t get the grade you don’t want, you’re going to be OK. Know you’re in a good place, you’re going to be fine.
