Did you know that Mrs. Grasso has been to over 14 countries and even lived in Guam and South Korea? She’s been to really cool places like England, Scotland, Portugal, Spain, Germany, France, and Italy. She loves every country she’s been to, but Dublin, Ireland was her least favorite because she had such high hopes after hearing people talk about how good their experiences were; hers wasn’t up to par.
Growing up, Mrs. Grasso moved around the United States a lot because her father was in the Air Force. She spent her senior year of high school in Florida and decided to stay there for college because she got a full-ride scholarship to the University of Florida.
Mrs. Grasso went into science over all other fields because, “Physics never made sense to me, but chemistry always did.”
She went on to explain that she didn’t do very well in English or writing growing up, but loved math and science and got her bachelor’s degree from the University of Florida and her master’s degree from the University of Arizona, both in chemistry. “Chemistry makes a lot of sense. It’s very logical and there are just a few basic principles, and if you understand them, you can apply them to a lot of different situations,” she said.
After Mrs. Grasso obtained her master’s degree, she worked in a lab for years but didn’t like it very much because she felt very isolated, and she wanted to be around more people. So, she set out on her teaching journey, and although Mrs. Grasso doesn’t have an education degree, she knows every little thing about chemistry.
Mrs. Grasso has been working at Sahuaro for five years and loves the school and her students. She makes it a priority to make sure her students are ready and prepared for college. “I have a lot of students who really want to have a good teacher and they want to learn and they’re really appreciative of it.”
It might be surprising to hear that Mrs. Grasso’s husband is an art teacher at Sabino High School, and even though our schools have a rivalry, they don’t take it too seriously. Believe it or not, Mrs. Grasso used to be a teacher at Sabino, which is how they met. What makes this even crazier is that her husband went to Sahuaro during high school.
Mrs. Grasso works with a lot of students each year and has a special bond with some of her students that carries on after they graduate. Mrs. Grasso said that she had a student several years ago who went to the University of Arizona tell her about how when she stepped into her college chemistry class, Mrs. Grasso’s teaching helped her learn and understand it.
Mrs. Grasso is an amazing teacher who helps her students understand their true abilities, and that is what makes her such a great teacher.
