At 15, I’ve had many different roles, but few have been longer than that of student. In my time, I have had many different schools and teachers, but perhaps none stand out more than Mr. Tim Lundt at Merit Academy.

He is a great teacher for many reasons.

One example. Last year when I was taking biology, we got to do an articulated skeleton project, which is fun just on the face of it. Perhaps you are thinking Mr. Lundt got his animals from some company dealing in this kind of thing. But that isn’t how Mr. Lundt rolls. He would personally source the animals locally through area contacts like rangers with Colorado Parks and Wildlife. We ended up with several different animals, although the one that stands out to me most was an animal we named “Ellie the Elk.” Animal in hand, we would remove the bones, clean and boil them, preserve them and then reassemble them. He would contact a welder to get a stand that was custom made for that animal. We then created stop motion videos of us putting the skeleton together.

Mr. Lundt’s dedication is not limited to the classroom. He has an extensive list of hobbies. He competes in Aquabike events, which are basically a triathlon without the running part. He routinely wakes up really early in the morning to swim laps before showing up at school to teach all day, only to go home and practice on his bike for several hours.

He competed in one event in Spain, something he had been preparing to do for quite some time. A few months ago, after Fall Break, I entered his classroom and saw written up on the white board: BIKE HELD HOSTAGE FOR 26 DAYS. I saw it a few more times and didn’t think much about it. After some time, I asked him about this. He recounted this story about his bike that was being transported back from overseas, but had never arrived. Rather, his bike and other athletes’ bikes had been taken as illegal collateral over a dispute between third parties companies. Him and his athlete friends formed an online community, and since some of them had AirTags, they were able to find their bikes getting bounced around the states before ending up at a warehouse in California — hence the hostage part. Now, these bikes are not easily replaceable and can even be quite expensive. After some 124-ish days, and a lot of adults talking to one another, Mr. Lundt finally got his bike back.

We’ve all had teachers that formed us. Mr. Lundt is one of those great teachers. He has a passion that is rarely seen, but contagious to everyone around him. He truly is a wonderful person and I am so grateful to know him. Thank you for inspiring me with your passion to embrace the world around me.

Ruth Wiseman is a Woodland Park native and a dual-enrolled high school student attending Pikes Peak State College