Q and A: Substitute teacher to open volleyball facility
Media by Sally Hunt
Molly Dean, substitute math teacher, plays for Parkway West against MHS during her senior year.
Molly Dean, substitute math teacher at MHS and assistant volleyball coach at Parkway West, is in the process of building a new indoor volleyball facility in Chesterfield Valley.
Q: Is teaching math your main job?
“No. I’ve been a teacher the past three years, I was a math teacher at Webster Groves High School. This year I stopped teaching altogether to pursue this project. [The position] fell into my lap. Mrs. Curtman is an old friend of mine and she called me and was like ‘Hey, I really need a sub and I can’t find one who actually knows how to teach math. I know that you’re not wanting to teach anymore but can I get you for four months.’ I said yes.”
Q: Why did you stop teaching?
“It’s been a lot of fun. I didn’t dislike teaching by any means, I just found something that I was more passionate about in this project. It’s fun to be back in a classroom, and I really enjoyed my time here, but it’ll be nice to be done in a couple weeks because I’ve been really busy.”
Q: What is your history with volleyball?
“I’ve played forever. My mom was the head varsity coach at Parkway West for 31 years. I’ve grown up in a gym. I think the first volleyball game I went to I was like a week old. So I started playing as young as I could, which I think was like six years old, and I started playing competitively at 10. It’s always been a big part of my life.”
Q: Explain your project to me.
“We’ve already purchased a big nine-acre plot of land and we’re gonna start building up on it by the end of February or March. What we’re building is a big facility and it’ll have ten hard courts and then there’ll be kind of a little barrier and then eight sand courts, all indoors.”
Q: Do you work with an organization?
“No. I work with investors but the project itself has been really just myself going into it and figuring out who can help me and how they can help.”
Q: What do you hope to offer at your volleyball facility?
“I think there’s gonna be a lot of variety. A big piece of it that I’m really excited about is the competitive youth side of it, and that’s why High Performance is a really exciting investor for me because that’s national level volleyball. Having those high school age kids in there training and getting better, that’s what I’m really excited about.”
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Jackson Estwanick, senior, was the Executive Producer of MHSNews and the Messenger from 2018 to 2020. He also cadet taught Intro to Digital Media Production....
