Teacher Profile: Mrs. Gruss

Who is Mrs. Gruss? Mrs. Gruss is a 7th grade math teacher at Rosemont. She has been teaching at Rosemont for 7 years but has also worked at a few other schools. Before teaching, Mrs. Gruss worked as a Teachers Assistant, she worked in a fabric store, and also worked at a bank as a teller. Mrs. Gruss attended Occidental College while she worked as a Teachers Assistant which is also when she noticed she wanted to become a teacher. She noted, “I really like explaining math and I found that out when I took the job as Teachers Assistant. I found it very rewarding to try to simplify math in a way that someone else could understand it, because math was something I understood easily, but it was a challenge for me to try to figure out why this other person would struggle to understand it.”
In addition, Mrs. Gruss’ favorite part of teaching is when a student asks a deep question and the class has a long discussion over it. Her least favorite part of teaching is dealing with discipline and having to contact parents over misbehavior. Mrs. Gruss’ favorite teacher when she was a child was Mrs. Hunt, who was her teacher from 3rd to 5th grade. Even though she loved her math classes, she also enjoyed her science classes a lot. Outside of school, Mrs. Gruss loves to read, bake, and spend time with her family, “We love playing games, like really nerdy games,” she noted. When asked what advice she would give to students, she said, “As you have a question, ask it. As soon as you feel like you don’t understand something, you need to stop and get that question answered, whether it’s from the teacher or someone from home…it’s important if it’s something you don’t understand, because that’s gonna keep you from moving forward.”