Scott, Jake

by Yulin Moore

Name: Jake Scott
Department: Math
Education: University of Maryland (College Park), Blake High School
Years teaching: 5
Year started at MBHS: 1997
Previous jobs: Renovator, bookkeeper, busboy
Hobbies: Basketball, baseball
Other: Loves working with kids and if hadn't become a teacher would have become a social worker for DC youth

Jake Scott, 28, has been at Blair for five years in the math department teaching algebra, geometry and pre-calculus. In Scott's classroom students feel a type of relief because of his laid back approach toward teaching. If a person doesn't understand a certain aspect of what he is covering he will slow down in order to leave no one behind. Scott makes sure everyone is learning the material because he cares more about a person walking away with knowledge than having a bunch of unanswered questions.

Scott is the youngest child in his family and remembers how his older brother and sister used to "double team" on him constantly. His father was a construction worker, and his mother was a dental assistant. While growing up he loved playing basketball and baseball. Even though Scott was too short to play basketball on his high school team, he never lost interest in the intense and competitive sport.

He graduated from the University of Maryland with his B.A. in math and a minor in communications/business. When Scott was 22 he began buying old houses around the Washington metropolitan area, renovating them and renting them out.

He feels that it is important for people in need to be able to receive affordable housing. Scott interviews each "rentee" at his/her current residence to "get a feel" for how the person will take care of the apartment or house he is renting out. He recalls one of his weirdest interviews when a woman's boyfriend came out of the kitchen in his boxers during the interview, drinking a forty- ounce bottle of beer. "He didn't even offer me anything to drink," Scott jokes.