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Meet Gordon Lyng

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Today we’d like to introduce you to Gordon Lyng.

Gordon, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
I was born and raised in New Jersey but have been moving all over the country the last five years with a purpose. The purpose of bouncing around was to acquire information and experience in multiple facets of education. My end goal is to be on the front lines of educational reform, revolutionizing how we teach our youth and develop healthy school systems.

I knew at a young age I wanted to be in education after I had multiple teachers/coaches speak to me as if I was limited or incapable of achieving any high levels of success. Through these experiences, I dedicated my entire professional career to understanding different educational systems and styles, all while making a positive impact on children.

I attended Kean University which is a top school for education in New Jersey where I also played four years of college soccer. Soccer has been a major pillar in my life. I have played internationally in England/Wales and China while also coaching internationally in Canada. I spent two years working as the Manager of Administration and a full-time staff coach for a high-level soccer academy during/after undergrad. The purpose was to manifest coaching techniques to improve me as a complete educator before committing fully to a traditional educational system. The administrative skills and experience working at a non-profit soccer academy have been invaluable towards achieving my goals. As a resource, the club harbored over 850 athletes at the time I worked there.

The summer of 2016 I took a chance and moved to Maine. I became an athletic director for an all-boys sports summer camp that develops boys ages 7-16, Camp Skylemar. The camp is so much bigger than sports. Kids are not allowed to bring any technology and we put a heavy focus on healthy human development. Responsibility, sportsmanship, and how to be kind one small act at a time are a few of the many pillars of camp. We are tucked away in the pines way up in Maine where kids come from all over the world. At camp, the opportunity to make an impact is 24/7. The people, the air, the scenery, all tie into the experience. I have met some of my best friends at camp and I will be going back this summer which will be my 5th time going back.

As a resource, the camp harbors close to 300 young boys each summer. While up in Maine, I was able to land a Graduate Assistant Soccer Coach position at Columbia College in Columbia, Missouri. Our waterfront director at camp is currently the Vice-President of USA Swimming and put me in contact with a friend who worked for the NCAA. With many opportunities exposed to me shortly after that connection, Columbia College required the graduate Assistant to work for both men and women’s programs which I thought was a huge plus, so I chose Columbia. Columbia has a winning bravado around the program. The men and women’s programs combined for a record of 71-13-8 during my two seasons and they each won back-to-back conference championships.

Missouri was an incredible experience. Earning my Master’s Degree and coaching college soccer was a path I always knew I would take. I was able to apply my coursework back into the school systems part-time while I was in Columbia. I worked in a preschool when I first moved out which eventually led to me rolling over my teacher certifications and becoming a substitute teacher in the district. This isn’t the most glamorous life, but I was constantly educating. I ended up subbing in over 12 schools in the district. Every day I would teach in a new setting, then head straight to two college soccer practices, and finish the night with graduate coursework. I finished my stint in graduate school with a 3.94 GPA and honors for the first time in my life. At this point, I was ready to transition into education full-time.

Accepting my first full-time job in a school was very emotional. I can remember dreaming about something as silly as having my own classroom for forever and it was finally real. I accepted a job at KIPP Northeast Middle School in Denver, Colorado. Naturally, I was heading up to Maine, but I was so incredibly anxious it seemed like that specific summer flew by faster than before. I left Maine, headed to New Jersey to dump my camp stuff and repacked all I could into a four-door Hyundai Accent. The very next day, I begin my journey across the country to a new life in Denver, Colorado.

Since being here, I have attempted to take on as many tasks as possible at school and in the community. A few accomplishments I have acquired in my second year of full-time teaching are:

6th Grade Level Chair – (Team lead linking teaching team and administration)

Community Engagement Coordinator – (Develop ways to leverage relationships between members of the community and our school).

School representative for the Parent Action Committee – (Essentially a parent/teacher organization)

Manager of Social Media – (Full creativity and development of multiple school social medias)

Chess Club Director – (I fundraised and fully funded a chess club with 32 students that meet once a week and will compete in local tournaments come Spring.

Head Boys and Girls Soccer Coach – (Most wins for boys in school history)

Director of Bike Library Program – (Using a grant from CDOT, I acquired 30 bicycles, helmets, and pumps for our students that live on campus. I have integrated this opportunity into the physical education program.)

Member of KIPP Health and Wellness team – (Design programs for teachers to help destress and renew)

I have begun to create relationships with stakeholders in the community on behalf of our school, started diving deeper into marketing and graphic design to promote events and student culture, and attacked leadership positions with passion and ingenuity.

A big goal I have which was the motivation for reaching out was to hopefully reach people in the Denver area that are interested in getting involved. I want to create workshops for our students that also provide opportunities for entrepreneurs, creators, etc. to showcase themselves in return for a life-worthy experience for kids. I can design a social media publication to assist with advertising, but feel as if we have a ton of talented individuals in the Denver area that can benefit from this experience. Our students need to see, feel, meet people who demonstrate the realities of life and have passion.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Struggle 1 – Moving Around/Stigmas

Moving around has not been easy and staying patient as I acquire experience in different fields is a long process, but I design a reason for each step. Each move that I have made since this educational journey began has been tactical and I have met a lot of great people. I have separated myself from friends and family which has me reflecting quite often on how much I miss these relationships. I also feel as if establishing roots and starting a “life” is something I am missing out on too, but my passion for education supersedes those emotions.

Unfortunately, I have met loads of people that also speak negatively about education in the United States. I have met peers whose professional goals steer them in different directions, but their advice is usually the same, get out of education. I have engaged with peers who adapt this stigma around what I am doing such as I am poor, I am not good at most things therefore I teach, or that I work with kids which is stressful/awful. These comments do not get me down but there are unnecessary speed bumps on my journey.

Struggle 2 – Childhood Trauma

At a young age, my parents had a nasty divorce. My father did some terrible things to my mother and our family and my mother is an incredible woman for staying strong through that part of our lives. She traveled over two hours total for work every day and still had time to drive me to sports practices, cook dinner, and be there for my brothers. She raised three boys by herself with 0 help from my father. This impact on me as a child fuels my commitment to kids who need positive role-models.

My father passed away a few years ago leaving nothing behind. He battled homelessness, alcoholism, schizophrenia, terrible motor skills due to a stroke, and other health-related/cognitive issues. I was fortunate to see my father the day he passed and made peace with him but held anger and resentment against him for many years. When I said my peace to him, he was in a coma. I believe people can hear you when they are in a coma and it was tough, but a very positive moment for me. I let him know that I forgave him and that I held no anger against him anymore. A few hours later, he passed. This significantly impacted my life and ingrained forgiveness and empathy into my brain.

Please tell us more about your work.
I don’t have a “business”, but I am creating a blog to showcase the positive experiences I have created for children, blended with the impacts those experiences will have on their lives. Another point of the blog will be to create relationships with entrepreneurs, content creators, business owners, to showcase their talents/skills in order to give students life-worthy experiences. I have desires to make this a non-profit or business-minded entity to get people into schools.

I have impacted over 5,000 students/athletes on this five-year journey which has been what I have been the most proud of. I have been able to build positive relationships with students of all different races, religions, and backgrounds. I have been able to be there for students when they feel no one understands them. I break down modern stigmas by just being a good person, being present, and being empathic. I don’t take these interactions lightly and often sacrifice what traditional 20 something-year-olds are doing to make lasting impacts with younger people. I am different because I will stop at nothing to improve the lives of as many young people as possible.

Do you look back particularly fondly on any memories from childhood?
My favorite childhood memory would have to be the time I got my first summer job at 14. I worked 55 hours, six days a week performing manual labor in a lumber yard where I grew up. The heat of summer made this job grueling, but it taught me valuable lessons such as hard work and showing up on time. I would work from 7 am-5:30 pm and head over to the high school for soccer practice from 6-8 pm. I was often dropped off in the big lumber transport trucks owned by the lumber yard which made me feel “cool” and that people were looking out for me. I would have to walk on the days where this wasn’t an option.

My incredible mother would do whatever she could but growing up, all my friends had the new gaming systems or the clothes that were “in” at the time. I never had the same experience it felt. I was incredibly proud to have this job, regardless of the physical toll it took on my body because I was able to begin supporting myself at a young age. I became very independent at a young age which I believe plays a massive role in how I operate today.

I cherish these memories very much and am very thankful.

Contact Info:


Image Credit:
Camp Skylemar Photography Team
KIPP NE Middle School Soccer Team – Parent Photographer

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