MORGANTOWN, W.Va.— A public school teacher in Tyler County was honored Saturday morning at West Virginia University’s graduation ceremony at the WVU Coliseum.
David Riggle, a world history and special education math teacher at Tyler Consolidated Middle School in Sistersville, received the Presidential Honorary Degree for his work as an educator and work in the community.
The honorary degree started in 1873 at the university to honor individuals whose outstanding contributions are important to the university, to the people in state or even the nation. The degree shows that the individual has achieved the highest standard of excellence and illuminate, advance, ease, and inspire the human condition.
Riggle said, on ‘Talkline’ with Hoppy Kercheval Monday morning, that he was truly honored to have been at WVU Saturday.
“I was just very honored to be a part of that ceremony and that dinner,” he said. “Just getting to know all those people from WVU and getting to know Dale Lee the WVEA president better and President Gee was just so kind and welcoming, it was really a joy to be there.”
Along with being a teacher, he is also the girl’s basketball coach and for the past 20 years he has volunteered for the Marshall County Special Olympics, as the coach for basketball, flag football and track.
He began volunteering for the special Olympics at the age of 15 and fell in love with it.
“That special Olympians approach life, first of all they don’t take it too serious, they just go out with a smile on their face,” Riggle said. “I feel like I’ve always gotten out of it as much as they do, I just hope that I can be for them what they are for me.”
He said that he continues volunteering because he has made lifelong friends through the special Olympics.
He also credited that his time volunteering for the special Olympics, made him want to become a special education teacher. He’s a graduate of West Liberty and began his teaching career in Wetzel County.
He says that showing the students that you care, is what it’s all about, even when it’s hard.
“They have to know that you care,” he said. “And sometimes it’s hard. Currently I’m teaching math, and you get the question all the time, when am I going to use this, when am I going to use this.”
He believes that while he continues to make an impact in the classroom, he is also impacting the community.
He says that teachers are given the job to transform the younger generation and by helping the community lets them know that they can stay in West Virginia.
“If they see us working hard to better our community, our state, that’s going to motivate them to stay home,” Riggle said.