Karin Damico completed her 18th year of teaching at Milwaukee Jewish Day School
As Karin Damico reflected on her 18th (Chai) year of teaching this past year, she found herself wondering: Is there something else I should be doing? Should I be aspiring to get into administration or do something different?
To Damico, the answer was simple: “I get to work with these amazing young people every day, and I really believe that teachers make such a huge difference. I really, really love my job, so why would I change it?”
Damico has spent her entire teaching career at Milwaukee Jewish Day School, teaching general studies to first, second and third grade students. She is currently teaching second grade and has been for the last six years. “I love second grade – it is the perfect, balanced sweet spot,” Damico said with a big smile on her face.
Damico grew up in Whitefish Bay and attended public schools there. She has extremely fond and vivid memories of her elementary school teachers. Those positive experiences, she said, sparked her interest in teaching elementary school. That, and the fact that three of her four grandparents were educators, so she grew up in a house where education was an extremely revered and respected profession. So much so that Damico’s two brothers also became school teachers. “I cannot remember anything I wanted to do with my life besides be a teacher,” she said.
After high school, Damico attended Miami University in Ohio, where she received her education degree. Damico then moved back home to Milwaukee and worked in the restaurant industry while looking for a teaching job. An opportunity arose to teach English as a second language in China with a friend of hers. While there, she taught English as a second language to elementary school kids for one semester, then traveled around Asia for a few months.
Once back home, a longtime family friend and teacher at Milwaukee Jewish Day School, Ann Gleishman, informed Damico of an opening at the school. She applied for the job and was hired to teach 1st grade soon after. Damico expressed that even though she didn’t attend MJDS as a child, it felt familiar. “I grew up Jewish and had friends who attended MJDS, and felt this was a great opportunity for me to teach at an amazing school and reconnect with my Judaism.”
After being there for now going on her 19th year, her feelings have grown even fonder of the school and community. Damico feels so lucky to have spent her entire career here. “I have no doubt that my path in teaching would be different if I taught somewhere else, but the community here is unbelievable. The way that I know the families here is so familiar and like family. I feel supported in both my professional life and personal life. It’s tiring and exhausting, but it’s also so fun!”
When Damico started at MJDS, she was fortunate to have great mentors to help her through. Nancy Dowling and Barb Lutsky taught her so much about how to manage a classroom, she said, and about how to treat and talk to kids. Today, even though Lutsky is long retired, she spends time each week volunteering in Damico’s class.
Damico resides in Mequon with her husband, Anthony, their two kids, Dominic, 9, and Dylan, 6, and their high-energy dog, Otis.
She explained that she is “fully immersed in boy world—sports are all day, every day!” Luckily, she grew up with two brothers and a dad who loves sports, so it’s not new to her. Damico loves spending time with her family. They enjoy going to Brewers games and sporting events and going on walks and bike rides together. During the summer, you can often find the Damicos spending time up north, enjoying the lake and going fishing.
Damico feels blessed that she gets to spend her life doing what she loves the most—teaching littles—and feels even luckier getting to do it in the incredible environment that is MJDS.
