Paloucek 1

Dennis Paloucek

Professor McDonald

English Writing

26 April 2017

Mr. Cashel or Coach Cashel

Mr. Cashel is a man well respected in the Webster Groves Community, where I was

raised, and is someone I look up to or think of when I am in a situation. What would Mr. Cashel

do in this situation? Mr. Cashel has been in my life for longer than anyone I know, not including

family, he has been one of the few constants in a world that is ever-changing. I first met him

when I was around 7-8. I believe I was in second grade when I joined his soccer club and soccer

team, Webster Groves Soccer Club. He was only my second soccer coach I had ever had, and he

remained my coach for the next ten years. I have made state history with him and learned history

from him. He is one the men in my life that I hold in the highest of regards. He has instilled and

established many of his impressive, respectable morals and ethics in me that I am proud to have

and hope to pass down to my children, and Mr. Cashel is someone who know how to bring out

the best in everyone around him.

Throughout the time I’ve known Mr. Cashel, we have had many different relationships.

At first, he was just simply my soccer coach. Then I became close friends with his son, who was

also my age and on the same soccer team, so he was now my coach and my friend’s dad. In high

school, I tried out for the soccer team, which he was the coach of. He was my old soccer club

coach, my friend’s dad, and he was now my high school soccer coach. For those of you who

don’t know the relationship between a club coach and high school coach is drastically different.

My junior year of high school I enrolled in a college level course, probably the hardest course in
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our high school. I now had a coach, teacher, and friend’s dad kind of relationship. The overlap is

prevalent and how complicated it was can be seen. I had a serious teacher in the classroom, a

hard, demanding coach on the field, and a caring father in my friend’s house. He seemed to me

to be the jack of all trades. In all those facets of life he would motivate and push me to be myself,

and the best I could be. Mr. Cashel was someone who always knew how to get the best out of me

and how to maximize my potential, whether it be in the classroom, on the field, or just in

everyday life.

Mr. Cashel is not only a good friend of mine, but I would also consider him a mentor of

mine. He is a nice, encouraging person who everyone loves to be around. He is a monumental

figure in my life who has enhanced my life and myself as a person greatly. I remember him as

my soccer coach all through elementary school and middle school. Webster Groves Soccer Club

was a great team consisting of the cream of the crop when it came to skill. Great memories

consist of him always saying “Come on Trey I know you can do it” or “Trey I need you to give

me your all today.” He was always a supportive coach win or lose, no matter the outcome he

would say, “Heads up boys it wasn’t in our favor today.” Losing was not a common thing for

Webster Groves, so when it would happen Coach Cashel would always pick the team back up

and tell the team to have pride in what we do and to remember the feeling of losing, and to take it

with a grain of salt. There is a state cup at the end of the season each year once you get to a

certain age. Coach took Webster all the way to the semifinals not winning by less than two goals

all the way to the semifinals, where we ended up having our best player break his collar bone ten

minutes in, ended up losing by more than four, and sadly fall apart for our last game playing

together forever as a club. After that last whistle blew we all were livid and filled with anger, but

Coach brought us together and told us to suck up our pride and shake their hands like men. It was
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a sad somber setting it felt like we just went to war and lost badly, but Coach managed to keep

his casual cool and brought us together and taught us how to act like well-mannered men. Since

he works at a public school, he can’t legally coach 8th graders or it is considered recruiting. I will

never forget our talk after that game. The passion I saw in each tear drop stream down our

coach’s face. The passion he shows and pride he takes in what he does can be felt from a mile

away. I will always remember that speech about how we were family and could always go to him

for help, how we define who we are by how we hold ourselves and act after this loss, and how

the pride we take in what we do speaks thousands of words to our character.

Mr. Cashel in high school was the same way as he was in elementary school, but he just

adjusted his approach and seemed to worry a little more due to us discovering ourselves in high

school, but he didn’t let his expectations slip. In fact, they seemed to rise as we aged. He held us

to his regular high standards. He expected us to be professional, level-headed, and dedicated. He

never accepted anything else than all we have. He would push us to our limits forcing us to do

stuff we never thought we could. Mr. Cashel not only pushed me on the field, but pushed me

harder in the classroom. Sports come more naturally to me more so than education does, and

Coach knew that and so he didn’t settle for anything less than intricate and extravagant in the

classroom. Whatever grade I earned on an assignment I did not earn it easy.

Mike Rose and Coach Cashel are not just similar, because they were both teachers, but

due to the fact that they help make the world we live in a better and more enjoyable world for the

people they directly work with or help. Mike Rose and Mr. Cashel are people, who help provide

guidance for the young and the lost. It seems both of these educators of life also have a precise

moral compass and are one’s to take after. Mr. Cashel provides good guidance for me in times of

need, and he has instilled in me what I would consider bright and legitimate morals. He has also
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taught me a desirable work ethic. He has shown me the importance of giving it your all and

making sure there are no regrets to be had. Mike Rose does the same for the students he tutors he

helps motivate them to not only do better in school but to give it their all and how to improve as

an individual.

Mr. Cashel had a way with words like no one I ever knew. His inspirational quotes’ or

motivational speeches’ rolled of his tongue like literature from Mike Rose. For example, on page

238 in Lives on the Boundary Mike Rose says, “We are in the middle of an extraordinary social

experiment: the attempt to provide education for all members of a vast pluralistic democracy. To

have any prayer of success, we’ll need many conceptual blessings: A philosophy of language and

literacy that affirms the diverse sources of linguistic competence and deepens our understanding

of the ways class and culture blind us to the richness of those sources. A perspective on failure

that lays open the logic of error. An orientation toward the interaction of poverty and ability that

undercuts simple polarities, that enables us to see simultaneously the constraints poverty places

on the play of mind and the actual mind at play within those constraints. We’ll need a pedagogy

that encourages us to step back and consider the threat of the standard classroom and that shows

us, having stepped back, how to step forward to invite a student across the boundaries of that

powerful room. Finally, we’ll need a revised store of images of educational excellence, ones

closer to egalitarian ideals–ones that embody the reward and turmoil of education in a

democracy, that celebrate the plural, messy human reality of it. At heart, we’ll need a guiding set

of principles that do not encourage us to retreat from, but move us closer to, an understanding of

the rich mix of speech and ritual and story that is America.” Mr. Cashel has been my Mike Rose

throughout life. He has put me under his wing to help me maximize my potential like Mike Rose
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in Lives on the Boundary. They both spent all their lives making the world a better place and

helping people around them.

Mike Rose helped tutor students and helped them when they had crisis’ in their lives. Mr.

Cashel is similar to Mike Rose for me. He has guided me through obstacles of life and listened to

me when I have had struggles in everyday life. I remember one time I was just having a horrible

week and me and a teammate got into a little verbal argument. Coach pulled me into his room

after that day and asked me what was wrong. I just busted into tears and broke down. He walked

over to me and just gave me a hug and comforted me reassuring me everything was going to be

ok. He said how he knew it was hard now, but how I was strong and how I will get over this hard

time and be a better stronger person after it. I know a lot of people in Lives on the Boundary had

hard life struggles and probably experienced worse than I could imagine, but I just picture Mike

Rose helping most of the students he taught like Mr. Cashel did for me that day I couldn’t be

more proud to have another person in my life I could call family.

I have noticed Mr. Cashel’s influence in my life almost every day, especially in my

advancements of literacy. He has taught me to give it your all and take pride in what you do. I

think of him every time I turn in an assignment, because he always used to say do everything like

you are going to sign your signature on it. I think my strong work ethic can largely be attributed

to Coach Cashel. His impact on me has made me the hard-working student, or just dedicated to

most things I do. This doesn’t only apply to school, but most times I’m on the soccer field, which

is often since I’m on UMSL’s soccer team, I think of his impact on my life.
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Works Cited

Rose, Mike. Lives On the Boundary : a Moving Account of the Struggles and
Achievements of America's Educationally Underprepared. New York, N.Y.,
U.S.A. :Penguin Books, 2005. Print.