A North Texas teacher will be honored in a big way Sunday.
Paschal High School in Fort Worth will hold a ceremony to rename its library after John Hamilton -- a longtime teacher and academic coordinator.
Hamilton has been a part of the Paschal school system for 50 years. Here is more from the Paschal High School PTA:
"When Hamilton first started teaching at Paschal in 1962, he was a student majoring in Mathematics at TCU. He taught Algebra and Geometry and then moved up to teaching honors classes while becoming the sponsor of the Student Council and Leadership Committee, Math Department Chair, and co-sponsor of the Whiz Quiz trivia team, all while completing his Master's Degree. In 1984 he was named the Math Presidential Award winner for the state of Texas. Hamilton still works in the academics office at Paschal part time with current Academic and Programs of Choice Coordinator Barbara Ozuna.
In the early 1980s, Hamilton was determined to improve the quality of advanced academics at Paschal. Through Hamilton's vision and dedication, advanced academic offerings at Paschal today rival those of any public or private high school in North Texas. Paschal is well known as an academic powerhouse, and leads FWISD in SAT averages. Paschal consistently graduates the most National Merit Honorees of any high school in our area - public or private. In 2012 PHS had 19 National Merit Semifinalists. In total, 61 Paschal graduates were recognized by the National Merit organization in 2012, including 24 commended scholars and 18 minority scholars. In May 2012, 574 Paschal students sat for a total of 1,347 Advanced Placement exams in 30 subjects, earning 199 scores of "five," 329 scores of "four," and 331 scores of "three." For years Paschal has led FWISD in the number of Radio Shack Scholars. In May 2012, Radio Shack recognized more than 800 Paschal students with a GPA of 4.0 or better. Hamilton is being recognized for his many contributions to Paschal including the creation of the PSAT/SAT summer course that thousands of students from across the Metroplex have attended since its inception in 1985; bringing the new position of Academic Coordinator to Paschal and proposing the idea for the entire district, thus creating the position currently in place at every high school in the district; and his work with College Board in promoting Advanced Placement courses to students."
The renaming ceremony will be held at the high school from 12:30 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. Sunday.
State Sen. Wendy Davis, City Councilman Joel Burns and State Rep. Mark Shelton will be in attendance along with several Fort Worth Independent School District trustees, district officials and Paschal staff and alumni.
Newsweek magazine recently ranked Paschal as one of the best high schools in the country, among the top 1 percent in the nation, the PTA said.
