By Milan Agarwala, Staff Reporter
From his high school Advanced Placement Biology teacher encouraging him to pursue a biology major and chemistry minor at the University of Pittsburgh, Chemistry and Forensics teacher Salvatore Colosi always knew he wanted to teach. Colosi started his career at Conestoga 12 years ago as a long-term substitute teacher and has taught here ever since.
Q: What is your favorite aspect of Conestoga’s community?
A: How passionate the students are for learning. I’m well aware of how lucky I am to be teaching here for kids who care, families that care and a staff that cares.
A: What are some of your favorite memories from your 12 years at Conestoga?
A: I’m really proud of the Forensic science course that we developed. Dr. Best and I developed the course six years ago. We had our vision for it, and we were able to make it the course it is today, just exactly what we wanted. It’s awesome being able to teach electives, especially when it’s a new course: If you put your name in a hat to teach it, and if you’re selected, they really give you free rein to design the course. It’s great because a lot of the students who take it do so because they’re genuinely interested.
Q: What is your favorite forensics story?
A: I think the O.J. Simpson case was just such a landmark case. First, it was the fame aspect. It was that it was broadcast on TV live every day, which never happens anymore. It was every day. I was 5 or 6 when it was going on, and I remember it being on the TV in my house every day. But in terms of science, it was the first time that most people in this country heard about DNA evidence because that technology was just coming into its own, and that was the first famous case where DNA was used. Now, everyone expects DNA in every case.
Q: What is your favorite concept to teach?
A: I like stoichiometry a lot. I also really like talking about light and electrons in chemistry, how the two kinds of particles and waves can be one and the same and how they create all these phenomena that we see every day. It’s so hard to conceptualize, but it is really cool.
Q: What is your favorite piece of lab equipment? What does it do?
A: It’s a giant one, but we got it for forensics. We have a Wi-Fi microscope. It is a double-lens microscope, and what you do is we have a tablet that we can mount, and whatever is on the slide shows up on the tablet. It’s awesome for a whole class to look at something. We use it mostly in forensics during our counterfeiting chapter. We talk about all the security features of money. So we’ll take $50 and $100 bills, put them on here, and you can see all the detail that goes into making the bills that you could never see just by looking at it.
Q: What is your least favorite lab equipment?
A: The plastic test tube racks because the wooden and metal ones are so much better, and they never actually hold the test tubes.
Q: What do you like to do in your free time?
A: I love running, cooking, reading and spending time with my kids at home. My daughter is 7, and my son is 4.
Q: What are some of your passions outside of what you teach?
A: I’m a huge “Lord of the Rings” nerd — the books, the movies, everything. I’m usually reading something from Tolkien if it’s not “The Lord of the Rings.” I coach my daughter’s softball team. My son’s going to start T-ball this spring. I love baseball. I’m a big Phillies fan.
Q: What is your favorite vacation spot?
A: Italy was my favorite vacation ever, but we go down to the Delaware beaches every year with my family. That’s kind of become our family tradition as our spot every summer.
Q: What is one message you would give to the world?
A: Be kind to everybody. It’s simple, and it would solve many problems.
Milan Agarwala can be reached at [email protected].
