NAME:
Julie Damschen
SCHOOL:
Helix Charter High School
CURRENT CLASSES:
AP Psychology, Psychology 1/2C
PHONE & E-MAIL:
(619) 644-1940 x334 and jdamsch@helixcharter.net
I am a native San Diegan and absolutely love it! I grew up in Lakeside and attended El Capitan High
School (and I survived it without ever converting to country music). I worked my way through college
managing a pediatric neurosurgeon's office. After I graduated from UC San Diego, I decided to
backpack through Europe. People had always told me that I should become a teacher, but I never
thought there was enough money in it. But living out of a backpack for a couple of months
can really change your priorities! So I got my teaching credential and my master's degree, and here I
am at Helix.
Since coming here in 1997, I have been involved in several activities on campus. I did Highlander
Camp my first summer, was an Extended Learning (ExL) tutor while I completed my student
teaching, been on several committees including Restructuring, Budget, and Department Chair (as an
Alternative Ed. representative), Class of 2003 Advisor (with Ms. Beltran), Peer Mediation Advisor (with
Ms. Vickery and Mr. Schultz), Humans For Humans (Amnesty International), Helix Animal Rescue
Team (HART), Invisible Children Club, Literacy and Technology Resource Mentor, Course Level Team
Coordinator, ASB Advisor, and Charter Board Representative.
I have taught Writing Fundamentals, Math Fundamentals, Reading Fundamentals, P.E., Geography,
Honors Geography, Life Management Skills, Psychology, AP Psychology and A.V.I.D.
In my free time I love going to the beach, traveling, movies, and amusing myself with useless trivia
games.
The below statement was written by Alan Feldman, an AP Psychology teacher at Perth Amboy High
School in New Jersey, but it so accurately articulates my own beliefs that I am stealing it...
"What do a schizophrenic, a split-brain patient, a preoperational child, a Freudian therapist, and a
rat in a Skinner Box have in common? They are among the roles I assume, along with dozens of
others, when I am teaching AP Psychology, the course I most love to teach. That's because it gives
me an opportunity to discuss in depth topics that are intrinsically fascinating, relevant to students'
lives, and have important personal and social consequences.
"Many social problems are behaviorally based, including anger, crime, smoking, racism, and child
abuse. An AP Psychology course can help students realize the positive outcomes of an authoritative
parenting style, the effectiveness and humanity of positive reinforcement to modify behavior, the
value of a clinical psychologist as compared to a friend, the effectiveness of reflective listening, and
a greater capacity to resist implicit and explicit group pressure through understanding research on
conformity and obedience.
"An underlying theme of the course is the importance of understanding objective, empirical methods
of collecting and interpreting data, including a basic knowledge of descriptive and inferential
statistics. In addition, students must be able to understand and critique descriptive, predictive, and
experimental research methods, and most, if not all, topics should be linked to the type of research
methodology that supports or produces them. Students should be aware of the logically permissible
appropriate inferences; conclusions, and generalizations that can be made based on the research
method used or statistical analysis applied. It is important to encourage students to question and
investigate the effect of the research methodology used in the information they acquire.
"Students should be inspired by the instructor to make meaningful interconnections between
disparate concepts. They should be asked to relate information to the major psychological themes,
including nature/nurture, continuity/discontinuity, change/stability, idiographic/nomothetic, mind-
body interactions, and homeostatic (opposing process) regulation. Perspectives include
psychoanalytic, behavioral, cognitive, humanistic, biological, and social-cultural.
"Once, a bright middle-school student asked me if any scientists were alive! That remark has
affected the way I teach, especially AP Psychology. I don't know of any field other than psychology
with such potential to generate student interest and excitement about scientific research. With the
introduction of each new concept, I make sure to mention the research of current psychologists and
try to help students realize that, like other sciences, psychology is a vibrant, continually expanding
body of knowledge in which new discoveries are made on a regular basis. "
If you think this sounds as exciting and interesting as I do, then you are in the right place!
