When you spot Alex Beck at Charlotte Latin School, he’s usually outside. Sometimes he’s supervising the Lower School garden, sometimes he’s managing the Upper School Ultimate Frisbee team, sometimes he’s leading classes of Lower School students on nature walks or engaging them in teamwork games — like an elaborate simulation of butterfly migration where students have to team up to put colored plastic balls in the right buckets.

On a recent Thursday morning, however, he was indoors, teaching a Leads With Honor class for a group of third graders. After quizzing them on the six attributes of the Portrait of the Latin Leader that the class seeks to instill (Curious Learner, Dynamic Communicator, Conscientious Thinker, Courageous Advocate, Humble Collaborator, and Resilient Navigator), he split them into six groups so they could assemble oversized puzzles of different book covers from the Ada Twist series. What he didn’t mention was that each group had one extraneous piece that another group needed.

A few minutes later, a student marched up to him. “They’re mixed up. We have another group’s piece.”

“That’s a good observation,” Beck said evenly.

“Should I give it to them?”

“That’s up to you.”

The student considered the situation and then demanded, “Did you do that on purpose?”

“What do you think?” Beck asked.

The student raised his voice. “Hey everybody!” he called out. “Mr. Beck mixed them up on purpose so we can collaborate with each other!”  Beck just smiled.

When you were growing up, did you want to be a teacher?

My mother worked at my kindergarten and was a Girl Scout leader — I have two older sisters — and an administrator at a summer camp. She would try out a lot of activities and personality tests on me, so I learned a lot about myself at a young age, which made me a very reflective person. Early on, I knew I wanted to be in the outdoors and I knew I wanted to help people. I wasn’t thinking about teaching, but I liked helping people grow. When I was in college, I thought that would mean leading people on ropes courses or kayaking trips. 

How did that work out?

I was a park ranger in South Carolina for three and a half years. And then I was a parks program supervisor in Cabarrus County for another three and a half years. I got promoted to park manager, but I didn’t want that — it was too administrative. When I got this position at Charlotte Latin, I realized that ten years down the road, I had landed my dream job.

What drew you to the outdoors?

When I was growing up, in the summers, when my mother took me to work with her at the summer camp, I would explore the woods until noon and then come back for lunch. I think that’s where I get my curiosity: exploring the woods and abandoned houses and retention ponds.

How does being outdoors support the leadership curriculum?

One of the things I love doing, especially with the younger kids, is introducing them to an app called iNaturalist. You can walk around and take a photograph of any living thing, plant or animal, and it will identify it for you, or at least get you down to a genus or family. And then it tracks your sighting on a global map, so you can see other people’s pictures from around the world. Scientists now use it to do research on migration. In the Portrait of the Latin Leader, it encourages being a Curious Learner. And then I can facilitate them asking questions — What is this? What does it look like? — that lead to being a Conscientious Thinker.

With second graders, I want them to have some understanding of what the words in the Portrait of the Latin Leader mean. In third grade, we discuss the definitions more. In fourth grade, we want them to be able to define the terms on their own. By fifth grade, they should be able to discuss how they would apply the terms in their own lives.

How did the garden start?

Latin had some wooden beds that were part of a Garden Club, with rosemary and flowers and some herbs. Then Laura Korkowski said, “What if we do this as part of the Leads with Honor program?” With some funding from the Student Leadership Development program, we replaced the beds, and we put new dirt in. And then we started experimenting with plants. Radishes are really good. Watermelon turned out okay — we might do that again. Blackeyed peas were experimental this year. It was amazing how prolific they are and what a long growing season they have; they’re not experimental anymore. It’s both an educational garden and a service garden — I try to keep that balance. This year, we donated 120 pounds of food to The Bulb, which provides vegetables for free in pop-up markets in food deserts. 

Tell us something about yourself that people might not know.

In the summer, I run a logrolling business. I learned about it through a Parks and Rec convention: I walked through the exhibition hall and saw an 11-and-a-half-foot red cylinder and knew I had to figure out what it was. It was this business that wants to make logrolling accessible to everyone so ultimately it can be an Olympic sport. The advantage of a synthetic log is that actual cedar logs can have wood chips come off, which creates drainage issues in pools. It’s basically a styrofoam baffle, 65 pounds when it’s empty and 465 pounds when you fill it with water.

What’s the trick to competing in logrolling?

You have two people, one on each side of the log. You’re trying to throw the other person off without touching them. It requires balance and core strength: 15 minutes of logrolling equals about one hour on a treadmill. You need really fast feet and you take tiny steps, like a chipmunk, so you can stay in control. If you’re falling too forward, you have to position your body like you’re sitting in a chair to bring your balance back on top of the log. I don’t usually compete, but one time at the Boy Scout Jamboree, I battled the #2 logroller in the world and beat him. Ninety-nine times out of 100, he would win, but that day, it was me — I have video.

How are you a better teacher now than when you started?

I have two classes left in my master’s degree in curriculum and instruction design. Working on that degree, I’ve become more aware of the ideology behind education and the reasons for doing what you do. There are so many people who teach the way they were taught — there’s some good in that, but there’s also some bad habits. When I was leading outdoor events that emphasized teamwork and corporate team building, we would talk a lot about the sequencing of events, and how you work through the problem-solving so that it builds community. Going through the master’s, I’m working through some of the same concepts but in a scholarly way. 

What are you curious about lately?

Environmental stewardship and how it aligns with science in the classroom. Understanding a food chain might be part of a science curriculum, while understanding how we affect a food chain might be a question of environmental stewardship. How do we collaborate with science teachers, complementing their work without taking over their curriculum?

What haven’t you done yet that you would like to?

Everything. I’ve got so many places to travel — I haven’t been outside the U.S. other than on a cruise. I have a friend in Uruguay and it’s all about finding the time. I’d love to work on a fishing boat, or even have a captain’s license. I want to see a blue whale.