Anthony Mullen: 2009 National Teacher of the Year

At the end of April, the White House announced that Anthony Mullen, a special education teacher in Greenwich, Conn., had been selected as the 59th National Teacher of the Year. A plain-spoken, unvarnished man of 50, Mullen worked as a New York City police officer for 21 years before leaving the department in 2000 to pursue his lifelong dream of becoming a teacher of students with special needs. Mullen is now a teacher at Greenwich’s ARCH School, an alternative high school housed in a tiny building with four undersized classrooms. Many of his students have behavioral and emotional disorders and are often on their last academic stop when they reach him.

Anthony Mullen in the Classroom

We recently spoke to Mullen about his method of building connections with hard-to-reach students, his experience at the White House, and what he hopes to accomplish as NTOY.

The following are edited excerpts from that conversation.