Once-retired teacher finds new Horizon

David Lively, whose 50th high school reunion was in June, was the kid who played school all summer using his old workbooks. Over the course of his career, he’s taught multiple grades, been a principal, retired from teaching once and was named this year’s teacher of the year for Mustang’s Horizon Intermediate.

There was never a question about what he would do with his life, except that one time in college when he was made assistant manager at a TG&Y store. It seemed like a reasonable idea to quit school and make great money. He celebrated with a bronze Chevy Malibu with a black vinyl top.

“I worked there maybe a year,” he said. “That’s all it took.”

He quit TG&Y to do his student teaching. Thanks to his father making the payments, he got to keep the Malibu.

“I had very kind parents,” he said. “My father only went through the sixth grade. He was very smart in math. I was the only boy who graduated, and he was very proud of me. He would have done anything to help me get my degree. My dad would have gone far in the world if he would have had an education, but he had to do hard labor.

"He helped build houses. He worked on a dairy farm. He worked for a place that made tillage tools. I have always wanted to make my parents proud of me.”

Lively attended a private Bible college in Missouri where he met his wife, who was also from the Oklahoma Panhandle. They moved back to Oklahoma, where Lively got his first teaching job in the consolidated Sharon-Mutual district.

He taught third, fifth and sixth grades before becoming principal for a couple of years. His career for the next 30 years took him back and forth between Missouri, with the landscape they loved, and Oklahoma, to be close to their families.

In 2010, he retired from Joplin Public Schools. Then they returned to Oklahoma for the final time. They didn’t have a choice really; their grandchildren were here.

Lively’s grandson was in the Mustang district, and Lively started substituting. When a special education teacher had to quit for health reasons the last nine weeks of the year, Lively took over.

“I thought, ‘Man this is fun,’ ” he said.

He taught fifth grade at Mustang Elementary one year, went back to filling in as a substitute teacher and then was a teacher’s assistant. He was standing outside as he did every morning, greeting the kids as they arrived for the day, when he was approached by Holly McKinney, principal of Horizon Intermediate. He loved working with McKinney, loved her positive attitude.

The next thing he knew, he was a math teacher at Horizon.

“This is one of the most positive buildings I have ever been in. Everybody helps everybody and we have such support from our leaders. That’s why I’m still here.”

Lively has simple rules for his classroom: Don’t overthink math; have fun; and his classroom is a haven.

He tells his students he’s there if they ever need to talk. He encourages them to talk to any teacher if they have problems, that they don’t have to go through it alone.

Lively loves working with fifth-graders. They’re still eager to learn and not too grown up, he said.

They appreciate it when he dresses up as Elvis, or as an elf at Christmas, and he manages to convince other teachers to dress up with him. For the 2016 Relay for Life, Lively, in a sequined ballgown and heels, won Queen of the Relay for the Horizon team.

Lively has been teaching at Horizon for three years.

“I’m shooting for two more years just because I don’t want to have a walker going up and down the hall. I’ll go as long as I enjoy it, and when I quit enjoying it, I’ll quit.”