A large number of students sit in a classroom, nervously discussing their charity research papers with their peers, hints of excitement lacing their voices. As soon as English teacher Ms. Sharon Swanson walks in, the usual questions and comments begin to arise. “When’s the due date?” “My charity won’t answer!” “Who do I ask questions?” “I need a hook for my paper. Many pregnancies are unplanned.”  Ms. Swanson answers each and every question with sass, the occasional answer dripping with sarcasm, and fits of laughter erupt from her students.

Every year during mid-October, Ms. Swanson assigns a research paper to her classes. Each student picks a charity, spends time doing thorough research, and explains why their charity is the best.

After going through all the papers, Ms. Swanson picks the paper she thinks best explained why its charity was better than the others. Students will donate money towards the winning charity and Ms.Swanson will match the money raised from her own pocket.

“Every year around Christmas, you know how people collect for the Salvation Army, someone put gold coins, just some random guy puts gold coins in the kettles that they collect and no one ever knows who they come from. It’s been going on for a long time,” Swanson said.

Many years ago, Ms. Swanson was reading about the gold coin giver in the newspaper and slowly, an idea began to blossom that expanded into something much bigger.

“I thought, God, that’s really cool, how some people give to charity and then I started thinking about how I’d like to give to charity. Then I started thinking about how my students have no clue about charities or anything else and how it’s a good thing for them to know about. And that’s how that got started.” Ms. Swanson said.

Many students have expressed what it’s like being in Ms. Swanson’s class. The most popular answer? Never boring.

“Her class is never boring,” sophomore Megan Buduan said, “not a single moment. She’s got this outspoken personality and she’s just so passionate about the things that she teaches. Especially about A Tale of Two Cities.”

“A Tale of Two Cities” by Charles Dickens is Ms.Swanson’s favorite book and something she doesn’t mind reading over and over again. Everytime she reads it, she discovers something new and intriguing that she didn’t notice before. She says the book is like a “puzzle” to her.

“The thing I like best about [ A Tale of Two Cities ] is the fact that my students hate it at the beginning, but at the end, so many of them say that it’s the best book they ever read and it’s their favorite,” said Ms.Swanson.

Her students agree with her and many of them are already calling it their favorite book, despite not being finished yet.

“We just finished this one chapter in particular and it left us with the biggest cliffhanger,” said sophomore Erin Kaihara, “and Ms.Swanson is making us wait until Monday to read the next chapter. This isn’t nice at all. You don’t understand how badly I want to read.”

What many of her students don’t know is just how passionate she is about A Tale of Two Cities and teaching. So passionate, that she doesn’t see herself retiring. At all.

“I don’t want to retire because I love what I do. I can’t imagine a more interesting way to go than to be in front of my class, teaching my absolute favorite book, waving my arms wildly around, and just keeling over,” she said, laughing.