After 17 years of teaching, adored and loved by many students and staff, Deborah McPherson will be departing from campus as a teacher, temporarily. This decision wasn’t easy, she said, spending months talking with others and being in turmoil with herself. McPherson is known for her  unconditional love for her students, connections with them.  For many she is the person they go to when they need advice or just someone to talk to. She has made an impact in the hearts and futures of many students even those who have already graduated that still keep in contact with her. From the beginning, she explained, her best interest was and still is for her students, making her step out a little more difficult, but she plans on still coaching Track and Field and being there for students – just not in the teacher position.

Apart from impacting the lives of students, McPherson is also a person of change, someone who wants to make changes and does it. She wants to make a change for the better and she has. She has brought back the color guard program, co-advises BSU, has headed up the ELD department, teaches U.S history, and is now taking up Ethnic Studies. She has made changes within these programs. With her, the color guard grew from 2 girls to over 14 students on the field and represented us at football games and in parades across the county. With her help BSU club is now being recognized by the state BSU organization and working with the local NAACP, and it continues to be the only one in the county.The English learners scores increased, and more were reclassified in the years she was EL coordinator than in several past years combined. With her help students found their way out of a system they were trapped in. Last year becuase her hard work and love for her students she received the District Teacher of the Year award. 

This year she hasn’t felt like herself, finding herself complaining about things which isn’t like her at all. She is a person of change and has felt that this year that wasn’t happening. Though she isn’t from Paso, it has become her home and wants to see it succeed. For that reason, she will take a break from teaching to get her administration credentials to become the change she and many others want to see. But don’t worry Paso Robles High, she’ll be back.