Mr. Addison grew up in a little town west of Fort Worth called Lipan. Growing up, his family was small. His dad was a hardcore hay farmer till the day he died and his mom was a teacher of math over at Mineral Wells. He has 3 half siblings as well. Nowadays, his mom lives out on the country alone and family gatherings are still small. It’s a very close knit family.

After high school, he graduated from Mineral Wells and then went to San Marcos and attended Texas state. After that he moved to Austin for about 5 or 6 years before venturing off to New Zealand for a year. He then ended up in Australia during Covid. What a place to be during lockdown! Once he came back to the U.S he decided to pursue teaching.

Before he came to the YMLA, Mr. Addison worked at poly tech. After the school went through surplusing, he ended up at the YMLA. Mr. Addison is a new arrival here at the YMLA. his first impression of the school in his words is, “Honestly, it is a far cry from my other work in other schools”. He really likes the campus size and the size of student body. “I like seeing what the scholars are doing and what they plan on doing in the future, it’s impressive”.

What Mr. Addison thinks makes the YMLA so special is the uniforms, college preparedness, and most importantly, the culture. “They definitely gear students to be scholars. The framing of saying scholars over students is an immediate way you set that culture in place.” Another thing he believes makes the YMLA special is the amount of ways the school sets you up for college. Programs such as Big Brother Big Sister, Dual Credit, Journalism, STUCO, and Senior days for college applications. He also says that there is lots of accountability.

Mr. Addison teaches U.S history and government. His government course is split into gov and economics. He teaches in a setting where the students study a lot outside of class to gain knowledge beforehand so that the class can go in depth on certain topics. In the classroom, he asks for lots of opinions to make sure his students opinions on history are justified and structured so that his students can us those skills outside of a history class.
His goals for his students are for them to be able to connect things today to their historical context. More specifically, he wants to make sure his students know that historical events don’t exist in a vacuum. For example, The Great Depression didn’t just happen, it had effects on the economy decades after it ended.

Mr. Addison also runs high school Whiz Quiz and outside of school, Mr. Addison has a few hobbies including going to the gym and trading card games. On Thursdays he plays cards.

Anyone who has been in his room can tell that Mr. Addison is very big into anime. His favorite anime is “One Piece”, his favorite manga is a limited release series called “zombie powder”, and his favorite obscure anime is “With A Dog And Cat Everyday Is Fun”

Something Mr. Addison wishes more people knew is that who he is at school is very different than how he is outside of school. While he may come off as “Hard nosed” at school, he’s really just a chill guy most of the time.

As a new member of the YMLA dream team, we welcome Mr. Addison with open arms. We can’t wait to see what you’ll do here at our great school.