Students may not have been able to imagine a day where they see their math teacher making his way to school on skates, but Algebra 2 teacher Jeremy Labelle rollerblades to school practically every day.
This unconventional mode of transportation can save the environment as well as provide some good exercise. Many students report seeing him around a nearby neighborhood and find it impressive and funny to see a teacher using rollerblades instead of a car.
“I’m trying to save my energy by using up my stored energy in my body because I have too much stored energy,” Labelle said.
However, this isn’t the only reason and benefit of his rollerblading.
“Also, it’s basically for exercise reasons, but the other benefit is I’m not adding pollution to the environment. I live close enough to the school, so I can make it in a reasonable time,” Labelle said.
Going along with the exercise benefits, according to the article “Your Life on Rollerblades: Healthier and Better For The Environment” a person can burn up to 840 calories just from rollerblading for an hour. That is almost as much as running for an hour.
When asked about statistical facts like this, Labelle considers the majority of them.
“I definitely take these statistics like that into consideration. Those numbers sound right and accurate too. When I use my health app, it says I’ve burned about 400 calories just by rollerblading for about 25 minutes,” Labelle said.
Now, this rollerblading habit might sound like it’s relatively new, but it turns out Labelle had been doing it for years. At Guyer about 20 years ago, some students would take pictures of him and make funny posts about his rollerblading.
“The kids would post the photos on a newsletter page for the school with a caption that said, ‘You know you’re at Guyer when you see this’,” Labelle said.
The good thing is the jokes are funny and not meant in a bullying-type of manner.
Although Labelle likes to rollerblade, he would prefer his own car instead of using them as a mode of transportation.
“I would use the car since it’s way more convenient, but I like rollerblading. I really like playing sports more, and rollerblading is useful for exercise,” Labelle said.
Mr. Labelle also mentions that he rollerblades and uses better cars to also protect the environment.
“I have an electric car now so it doesn’t do as much damage to the environment and rollerblading is useful to use less gas,” Labelle said.
One of Labelle’s good friends, Jerome Noel, who is also a math teacher, even expressed the joke behind a teacher rollerblading.
“I think it’s much more interesting to the students because they have something to poke fun at him about,” Noel said.
Also, Noel could potentially use another mode of transportation other than his own car.
“I have a little scooter, but it’s not like a traditional Razor scooter because it has these gargantuan wheels on it like a bike,” Noel said.
It would definitely be an option to use, but Noel says that he would rather take his car to work.
“The problem is it would probably take me about two hours to get to school so I would stick to my car. My 8th graders would be like ‘where’s Mr. Noel?’ because he’s scootering to work,” Noel said.
It is definitely interesting and hilarious to see a teacher become known for rollerblading to school every morning. It is also really impressive dedication towards exercise, the environment, and even Labelle’s job as a teacher. He deserves the credit and kudos for these dedications and maybe inspire others to become committed to using other modes of transportation other than cars.
