Inductee number four of the 2024 National Teachers Hall of Fame class has been announced.
Retired chemistry teacher Joe Truesdell of Hilo, Hawaii learned he would be one of the five inductees this year during an announcement made at his former high school, Kamehameha Schools, a private school system, Hawaii High School Friday morning. Truesdell’s classroom career began back in 1987 when he traveled to Hawaii to study for his Ph.D. in synthetic organic chemistry.
While working on his dissertation, Truesdell took a substitute teaching position at Kamehameha Schools in Honolulu and came to realize he loved being an educator more than a chemist. Truesdell would remain with Kamehameha Schools from 1987 to 2021 and finished his final year in the classroom at Tuba City Middle School, a school within the Bureau of Indian Education in the Navajo Nation of Arizona.
A news release from the National Teachers Hall of Fame states that Truesdell, and many of those who know him, would attribute his success in the classroom to his desire to embrace and utilize native culture in the classroom. Former Kamehameha Schools President Dr. Michael J. Chun stated “Joel was one who embraced assimilation, however, this time into the host culture of these isolated islands in the Pacific. His interest in and commitment to the Hawaiian culture have been genuine and authentic.”
Truesdell is just the second NTHF inductee from the state of Hawaii. He now joins music teacher Keith Ballard of San Diego, California, English teacher Shelly Moore Krajacic of Milwaukee, Wisconsin and Terry Kaldhusal of Wales, Wisconsin as members of the 2024 Hall of Fame class. One final inductee is set to be announced in the coming weeks before the Hall of Fame has its formal induction ceremonies — early May in Washington, DC, and mid-June in Emporia.
