Charlie Giglio (photo, above) likes to say that about his career: “I kind of worked my way up the river.”
He’s also worked his way up the adult honor roll: In 2015, he was named New York State Teacher of the Year, and the National Education Association has just named him a Global Learning Fellow. He is one of 31 educators who will be carrying this prestige to Peru for 10 days of international field study as part of a yearlong academic program.
Giglio’s career began humbly. With the Hudson River as his nexus, he went from New York to Poughkeepsie to Albany, moving from elementary school to college to education director for state prison professionals in forensics. Then he retired.
But, ultimately, that just meant switching rivers. He took a half-year position to phase out the public school Latin program in the small town of Gloversville in Fulton County alongside the Mohawk River — and then decided instead of shutting it down, he’d fire it up.
Ten years later, it is still red hot.
His students visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Cloisters in New York, and spend four days in Washington, D.C. to explore Latin culture. Every other year, they cross the sea to visit Italy and Greece. In addition to Latin classes I, II and III for grades 8-10, Giglio got students access to college credits through the University at Albany, a State University of New York campus, in courses taught in Gloversville.
The acclaim for the Latin program captained by Giglio has reached far beyond the pockets of this floppy community, once known for leather glove making and movies, and then abandoned by most.
“Once news of the Latin program became public, I received the Channel 13 (WNYT, an Albany television station) Top Teacher Award, nominated by students,” Giglio said.
The teacher of the year award followed, and between that and his recent NEA honor, he has hosted 60 speaking engagements and has met President Barack Obama at the White House.
“We each had a minute in the Oval Office and he (the President) was telling me about his fondness for Latin,” Giglio said. Then a group of state teachers of the year hung out for a half hour in the Rose Garden.
“We sang for him. He said it’s his favorite day of the year, meeting teachers,” recalled Giglio, who last year addressed the NYSUT Representative Assembly in Buffalo.
Just after his visit to the White House, Giglio was noticed elsewhere in the community where he teaches. “That’s when the library called and asked if I would help them,” he said.
Ever since, he’s been volunteering his time to help rejuvenate the Glovervsille Public Library, a majestic building in the Beaux Arts Style funded by Andrew Carnegie and now on the National Registry of Historic Places.
The limestone and brick building, with its elegant arched windows and curved entryway, is what Giglio calls an “architectural gem,” along with the other 1,500 libraries built with funds donated to communities by Carnegie.
Giglio is working with volunteers, including notable Gloversville native and Pulitzer-prize winning author Richard Russo to raise $7 million to refurnish and update the library, which was still operating with it original boiler more than 100 years after it was built in 1904.
Now he is elbowing his way through his calendar to make time for the work of being an NEA Global Learning Fellow. NYSUT President Karen E. Magee nominated him for the award.
“NYSUT has been marvelous,” Giglio said.
He and the other fellows have all received three days of training at NEA in Washington.
“We’re representing our culture, and we’re learning their culture,” he said. “We’re trying to cultivate knowledge and tolerance of other cultures.”
In the training, the fellows wrote global lesson plans on what unites cultures. “I chose the topic of grief – how it’s expressed in families and different cultures.”
Already in the Latin college classes he teaches, students study Mozart’s Requiem. “Music is the universal language for expressing grief,” Giglio said.
Fellows also launched a crowd-funding campaign called “Books for the Students of Cuzco” on Indiegogo, and funds will go toward purchasing books to be delivered by to school libraries
And then it’s back to fundraising for the 2017 sixth Gloversville school trip abroad.
Home base is Albany, where he lives with his wife, Patricia, and his dog. Tanner, a yellow lab mix certified therapy dog who accompanies him to class and to some of his talks.
In the classroom, home is somewhere between Tanner’s paws, the students and the motto he has hung up: Fiat Lux. Let there be light.
“I believe that’s what teachers do with students. They enlighten them. Your relationship with your students allows illumination to occur, and then they’re a student for life,” Giglio said.