Jennifer Carey
LHS Biographies
June 14, 2021
Jennifer Carey, a social studies teacher, has been teaching at Lowell High School since the 1995-1996 school year. She also teaches the Dual Enrollment Psychology and Children and Adolescent Development courses. Ms. Carey is the Girls Tennis Coach and has been instructing students since her first year at Lowell High. When she was first hired at LHS, she was a Freshman Cluster teacher where she taught world history. She loved teaching, but she didn’t like the subject, so she was thrilled when the psychology and sociology position opened so that she could teach what her passion is. Although this is her twenty-sixth-year teaching, she has been a teacher for a total of thirty years. She was at LHS for one year under the Health Protection Grant, where she worked throughout the system on smoking cessation programs, peer leaders, and peer mediation. She was employed for one year at Woburn High School under a grant with Middlesex Community College, where she was a 9th grade teacher supporting students at risk, offering them study skills and time management skills. Ms. Carey also worked two years at the Greater Lowell Vocational under the Health Protection grant, where she taught a senior health class, a pregnant and parenting class, and a smoking cessation class. She has always wanted to be a teacher, although she did think about becoming an administrator. Ms. Carey has been playing school since she was five. Her mother was a seventh-grade math teacher in Lowell, so she was always helping her mom correct papers or attend the after-school tutoring that she would run. She looked up to her mom and wanted to be like her. Plus, she loved the idea of being able to be home during vacations and snow days when the day came that she, herself, was a mom. She earned her Masters in Education and her CAGS in hopes of becoming a Department Chair, but she realized that she loves being in the classroom and working with students. Throughout her career, she has earned a Bachelor’s in Psychology with a minor in Sociology and Secondary Education because she wanted to teach psychology. Additionally, she has earned her Master’s in Education from Fitchburg State University.
Ms. Carey was born and raised in Lowell, Massachusetts. She notes that Lowell hasn’t changed from that she grew up. Her first job was as a lifeguard for the City of Lowell Parks and Rec Department. She grew up with three siblings as the youngest. Her sister Milissa is 60, her brother Rob is 59, and her sister Michelle is 57. When asked how many different places she has lived, she says that she is a “Merrimack Valley girl through and through.” She did live in North Andover for five years, but she moved back to Lowell in 1999 because she wanted her daughter to also be raised in Lowell. Her daughter Paige played tennis and swam for LHS, and was the captain in both. Paige is currently a junior at Keene State College in Keene, New Hampshire, where she is majoring in Biology with a minor in Chemistry. Ms. Carey has a four-year-old red Siberian Husky named Tundra. Her daughter came across the puppy when one of her classmates explained to her that his Siberian Huskies accidentally had puppies and was trying to sell them. Her daughter told Ms. Carey about it, and they instantly decided that they wanted to bring one of the puppies home. If Ms. Carey was given a choice to live anywhere in the world, she would want to stay in the USA. She would venture beyond my love for the ocean and move to the mountains where she can enjoy running along trails and hike more. Her greatest accomplishment was getting out of a toxic marriage of twenty years and raising her daughter as a single mother for the past six years! She and her daughter have bonded and become stronger throughout the years and realized that the past cannot be erased; however, it is what is ahead of that matters.
Ms. Carey’s favorite thing about Lowell is all that it has to offer in such close proximity. She explains that “Lowell is a big city, yet it is small in so many ways. Everyone seems to know everyone and lots of people that were born and raised in Lowell end up raising their own families in Lowell”. She loves the Lowell High School community because of the collegiality she has with the teachers. She is also to talk outside of school, share teaching strategies and develop friendships stronger than ever because of COVID.
In her spare time, Ms. Carey enjoys running. For the past six years, she has run almost every day with her dog. She ran the Baystate Half-Marathon in 2015 and was hoping to participate in 2020 until the pandemic hit. Besides running, she loves watching reality TV, including Big Brother, My Big Fat Fabulous Life, Smothered, along with many others. Currently, she is watching the show Blacklist on Netflix, which she also loves. Her favorite book is The Training Camp by Jon Gordon, although she enjoys any book that Gordon publishes. She likes The Training Camp the best because it looks at how an injury in athletics can actually be a positive thing since you are getting yourself stronger physically and mentally. Ms. Carey’s favorite song is Butterfly Fly Away by Miley Cyrus because it always reminds her of her daughter and when she would have to “release her” as she grew up.
Although Ms. Carey hasn’t traveled to many places, she loved Chicago when she went there to play a National Father-Daughter Tennis Tournament with her dad in 2005. She enjoyed it so much that she took her daughter Paige back in 2010. Ms. Carey has also been to St. Lucia for a vacation in 1994. She only speaks English. However, she did take Spanish in high school for four years, although she admits that she can’t carry on a conversation to save her life.
Her favorite childhood memory would have been when she tried taking her mom’s car to swim practice one day, but as she pulled it out of the garage, she turned the wheel and hit the front end. She left a note apologizing and just went to practice. Thankfully, when she got home, her parents weren’t upset with her. Fast forward, her daughter drove her car (with her in it) through the garage door while she had her permit and took the double door off the hinges straight into the garage. Ms. Carey, similar to her parents, wasn’t mad at her daughter.
Lastly, Ms. Carey’s motto in life is “The days are long, but the years are short,” and slowly, she has begun to embrace the motto: “Inhale the future and exhale the past.” Those two quotes keep her focused and reminds her of living in the moment and not dwelling on the past or wishing the days away.
