Beloved teacher encouraged, inspired Keystone Oaks students

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Over 33 years, Thomas Todd taught all grades at the Keystone Oaks district elementary schools, several middle school classes and worked as a high school assistant football coach.

He loved them all, but his favorites were always the third-grade students.

“He thought third-graders were the best people in the whole world,” said his wife and fellow educator Annette Todd. “There was still an innocence about them, they’re impressionable and they still laughed at his jokes.”

Quite a few of his former students — some from as long as four decades ago — attended Mr. Todd’s memorial services this week, his wife said. Mr. Todd, of Collier, died Dec. 8 after a long battle with frontotemporal dementia. He was 65.

The teacher and coach grew up in Westwood, his wife said. He studied education at Edinboro University and got a job teaching elementary school in the Keystone Oaks School District, where he worked until he retired in 2008. He was also an assistant football coach, leading six undefeated freshman teams, and a softball coach with his wife, leading two teams to the championships.

“The kids loved him, and he loved being with the kids,” Ms. Todd said. “He had a tendency to really provide a shelter for the kind of quirky kids. He allowed them to be who they were, whether they liked comic books, or singing and dancingor baseball or magic.”

Sandy McCann, a longtime friend and colleague of Mr. Todd, said her younger brother and her three sons were all students of his.

He was one of the most “sought after” teachers in the district, said Ms. McCann, who worked with him at Aiken Elementary School.

“He could bring out the best of his students,” she said. “Kids who may not have liked school, they had one year that they loved it because of him.”

Mr. Todd always drew a character on the chalkboard named Joe Bag of Doughnuts reminding his students to obey the rules. If they answered a special question correctly, he rewarded them with exactly three M&Ms. He wore a NASA astronaut suit for his lessons on space, and Mr. Todd famously read each of his classes the books “Old Yeller,” “Because of Winn-Dixie,” “The Indian in the Cupboard” and “Stone Fox.”

“There’s probably not five kids in Green Tree who wouldn’t list those books as their favorite, because he read them to them,” Ms. McCann said.

And Ms. Todd said he was the same person outside the classroom.

“He was everything they thought he was,” she said. “Sometimes we romanticize teachers, but he was good and kind and compassionate and he enjoyed being with them as much as they thought he did.”

In addition to his wife, Mr. Todd is survived by his son, Matt Todd of Pennsbury Village; his daughter, Katie Todd of Collier; his brother, Frank Todd of Seven Fields; and his sister, Bonnie Carlson of South Fayette.

The funeral was Tuesday at St. Margaret of Scotland Church.

Donations may be made to the Aiken Elementary School library or a bike trail of your choice.