Sometimes the quietest people have the most to say. This saying fits new math teacher Rashidur Rahman to a tee.

Growing up according to the values native to Bangladesh, Rahman says life there was much different.

“We had more restrictions than here,” he said. “Your main focus was academics before everything else. You were not allowed to play games or sports until you proved that you could do it academically.”

Due to the lack of a strong relationship with his father, Rahman didn’t want to follow in the footsteps of his dad.

“He would never acknowledge the good,” he said. “He always wanted better. I think my mom has molded me more into who I am today.”

His mother’s words pushed Rahman to pursue avenues other than business and politics without worrying about his father’s input.

“She always told me to do whatever made me happy and not worry about what my father thought,” he said.

After being grounded from his pilot dream for health reasons, Rashidur traveled back home hoping to find inspiration from his parents.

“My dad told me that I had to get my college degree,” he said.

Since earning his degree in something that was typically not a teaching degree, he says that getting into teaching at the high school level was the work of fate.

“My degree is in information systems so being a teacher was my destiny I guess,” Rahman said.

Now in his first year of teaching math at DHS he uses advice from home as a guide in the classroom.

“When you go out in this world, learn from those who are better than you,” he said. “What you learn from them pass that to others who don’t know. If I see something that is working well for somebody else I try to put that into what I am doing and see if it works,” Rahman said.

Rahman worries more about what students are learning than what they are scoring.

“He told us it’s not about the grade it’s about the learning,” senior Hannah Alling said.

In high school, Rahman found that he had a knack for helping people with schoolwork.

“I’ve always enjoyed helping others. It started in high school when I was helping my friends (with schoolwork),” he said.

It was this experience that led him to teaching.

“When I went to college, I worked as a tutor and then I figured I wanted to be a teacher,” Rahman said.

The transition of lifestyles from the luxurious and rich to living on his own and earning his own money was quite drastic but sometimes change can be good.

“Everything was handed to me. I had to figure out how to wash clothes and put gas in my car,” Rahman said.

From a student’s point of view, Rahman is a teacher who’s teaching knows no bounds.

“I see him as someone who enjoys his job. He actually teaches his own way instead of handing us packets of notes from the book,” senior Roy Hakins said.

While teaching was never his first option, fate seems to have led him here.