William Granieri, the newly-hired religion teacher, is excited to join the John Carroll community.

Mr. Granieri has been teaching on and off for over 20 years in different states. He has taught Theology at four schools. The last state he taught in before Maryland was Florida where his wife currently lives.
His wife is an opera singer from Poland, and Mr. Granieri has experience coaching baseball along with football. In fact, he has his own Eyeblack company. He left Florida because he felt the work environment was starting to become negative, so he decided to move onto to another occupation.
He had been working at a cemetery up until about several weeks ago when he heard something about John Carroll from his godfather, who is head of a school in New Jersey. His godfather told him that there was a spot open, and this led Mr. Granieri to check John Carroll out.
Regarding his first impression of John Carroll, Mr. Granieri said, “I think it was the overall welcoming and kindness of the administration and faculty because it had to be a place I thought was a good fit for me if I was going to be working here.”
During his first week, Mr. Granieri didn’t teach at all, but instead observed Mr. Goedeke’s classes. He lives in the dormitory with the international students and was even able to bring his cat. Currently, he teaches morality to juniors and church history to sophomores.
He said, “This so far has been like winning the lottery. It has been very vibrant and joyful, and that’s different than being happy. Joyful is something a little different that is part of who you are, and it is genuine.”
He even has noticed the tightly-knit community at the school and all of the alumni who come back to have their own children go to JC or to work at the school. He noticed this was unlike most of the schools he has worked at. In regards to alumni, he said, “You aren’t here for four years, you are here for forty years.”
When teaching, Mr. Granieri brings many different teaching styles to try and modernize the textbook in a way students can understand better. He has been teaching for so long that he likes to teach his way and reflect the principles of the textbook.
He said, “I guess my approach is to be yourself; I don’t try to compare myself to anyone else, but I like to do different things in the classroom such as class lectures, PowerPoints, videos, things on current events, and class discussions.”
Mr. Granieri is “happy to be at John Carroll” and is “excited to see what is in store for the future.”