By Faith Maquinales and Caleb Joyce

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Mr. Charles Oversby, a man with Viking in his blood, graduated from Rim of the World High School in 1976, then went on to Brigham Young University and graduated 8 years later. At the age of 26, he was done with his studies and had a life of teaching ahead of him. Before working at SBHS he worked at Pacific for a semester and then a mandatory “student taught” semester at Cajon. Now in the year 2019 he has announced retirement, somewhere in the middle of 2020 Mr. Oversby will no longer be with us at SBHS.

After retiring, he plans to spend his time as he always has, historical recreations; the Renaissance Fair with our very own Mr. Corigliano (his on campus “best friend”) and whatever theatrics come his way. But then again he isn’t alone; he will also be spending time with his wife of 39 years, Lydia, gardening and just enjoying each other’s company. It wasn’t much of a surprise to me when Mr. Oversby was asked what his motivation was for continuing to stay at SBHS so long. His response was simply, “I like kids, I like my students, I like making a difference in their life.”

Many students had something to say about him.

“I like his humor, and I like how he treats us like humans. I actually understand what he’s teaching and he likes to make dumb jokes,” said Byron Pastrana 

“I think Oversby is really good at teaching, he really interacts with people, he isn’t childish but he knows how to teach people. For example, with a bunch of immature kids learning about sex organs and stuff like that, he goes and does some sex jokes, but he does them because he knows it’ll get their attention. He gets their attention with a joke which is why everyone thinks he’s so funny, but what they don’t realize is that he’s teaching them, at that moment, with a joke, and I think that’s genius. Mr. Oversby is a genius,” saidCarlos Orbes, 12. 

“I love him. I don’t necessarily like the work he gives us, I just like gazing at his face. Well, sometimes the work is interesting. He has swag,” said Nicholas Alarcon,11.

“He’s straightforward, he doesn’t take any sh*t from anybody, he’s honest,” said Alize Martinez, 11.

For those of you who have never gotten the chance to hear one of Mr. Oversby’s stories, here’s a gift – one of Mr. Oversby’s most recent stories, in his words.

“It was hilarious, one day Mrs. Craig, who was the principal came up to my room holding a cat head, and said, “Is this yours?” 

You see I used to let the kids take the cat head home, to dissect the brain, the spinal cord, the eyes, bring it back and give them extra credit. Well, one of the kids went and took the cat and shoved it up inside the soda vending machine, so I guess what happened was some poor little freshman girl came plunked her money in to get a soda and out popped a cat head, and she was down at the principal’s office saying *squeal*.

I didn’t want to find the kid, I was too busy laughing my a** off. I was trying really hard not to laugh in front of the principal.”

When asked what his last words to his students would be if given the choice his reply was “be happy, live a good life.”