Faculty of the Week: Barbara Desmond

By HANNAH PARK and CHENGYUE ZHANG

Travel enthusiast and English instructor Barbara Desmond begins her day early, taking her daughter to carpool before heading to her classroom, where she spends most of the afternoon, grading, teaching, and working on her emails. 

In her classes and advisories, the EASA advisor and Wheelwright dorm faculty brings her natural warmth to the table. Her constant check-ins and genuine kindness make her a mother figure to many, especially to lower Zara Virani, who describes her as “motherly, caring, kind and thoughtful.” 

Virani described a warm memory of Desmond, who helped her during a rough time. “When a dorm mate of mine had to leave unexpectedly, it hit me really hard. Ms. Desmond was there for me, baking me cookies, talking to me, and even offering to buy me food,” she said.

Desmond’s advisee and prep Jessica Phan agreed. “I trust Ms. Desmond a lot... She always checks in during and outside of advisory, and she consistently shows that she cares about me,” Phan said.

Before this seventeen-year English Instructor came to work at the Academy, she taught at a small boarding high school in MA called St. Mark’s. Her passion for English and decision to become a teacher was cultivated by her upbringing. “I come from a family of readers and storytellers who are not necessarily college educated. [They are] people who were always passionate about reading, but didn't necessarily go to college, and those were the people who inspired me, my dad and my great uncle,” Desmond said.

“[My father] always encouraged my sisters and me to pick something that we were really passionate about as our career choice and to pursue it regardless of financial gain, so that's how I ended up becoming a teacher and studying literature,” Desmond added.

“I could have gone a lot of different ways with it,” Desmond reflected, speaking of an early job in publishing. “I realized I didn't want to do [publishing] because it was really about wheeling and dealing and getting the right book contracts and going out to lunch and being on the phone all the time. So I went back to graduate school and started teaching and I realized how much I enjoyed teaching.” Desmond taught in colleges until an unexpected summer high school teaching opportunity arose and she fell in love with high school teaching.

For Desmond, the Harkness Method is one of her favorite parts of teaching because of “the discovery.” “I love being in a classroom and the back and forth of the Harkness classroom in particular,” Desmond said. “It truly is best when you are on the side watching young people discover and talk about ideas. I also love the challenge of being there and helping them, but standing back to and not taking over and just watching it unfold. It's pretty beautiful.”

“Ms. Desmond has had the greatest influence on my own teaching, especially when we team-taught ENG 589: Reimagining the Classics. Observing her at the table has inspired me to work on my own Harkness skills and to become a better listener,” Desmond’s husband and Classical Languages Instructor Nicholas Unger said.

Her love for teaching and care for others is clear to her students as well. For Virani, this has been the case both in and outside the classroom. “I think Ms. Desmond, unlike the other teachers I know, has this motherly touch that always makes me feel safe and watched out for. Being a mother herself, she has this instinct and she can always tell when someone’s having a stressful time. She’s very easy to talk to and because she has kids, she is able to provide that mature yet parental view that most teachers just can’t do,” she said. “I admire Ms. Desmond’s resilience and willingness to take care of us. Even in the time when she had COVID and was sick, she was able to help me organize a project I had going on.” 

  Though Desmond’s kindness reaches all she interacts with, she especially appreciates the opportunity to teach preps in their first Harkness English class while teaching seniors at the same time in fall term. “You just see how much people grow up in the course of their four years here. It's incredibly dramatic. They’re getting, in different ways, all of the joys of teaching here,” Desmond said. “On the one hand, you have the preps, you're so curious and engaged and sometimes a bit chaotic. Then on the other hand, you have the seniors who are so thoughtful and independent and able to really dig deep and ask all the questions.”

“[Ms. Desmond] has a warm presence in the class. Even if it's 8 A.M. class, she always has an infectious sort of happiness that students just feel in my experience. I just feel more energized and more compelled to participate because it feels like she is always genuinely excited to see you every day,” senior Anya Tang explained. 

Tang continued, mentioning how Desmond sometimes lets their 8 A.M. classes go to Wetherall to briefly grab breakfast because she is worried about her students not eating breakfast. “Having that level of concern for a student that goes beyond their grades or what they turn in is something that I have not seen in many other teachers in my life,” Tang said. “To have a presence like her is so consistently warm and nurturing. That is what encourages me to not just be a better student, but to be a better person.”

English instructor Christina Breen mentioned that in the 25 years she has known Desmond, she can describe her as an ‘excellent leader and consensus builder.’ “I find [Ms. Desmond] to be a warm and generous colleague and friend. She is so smart and patient and she brings these qualities to her work in the department, the dorm, her clubs and her advisory. She is an outstanding listener and knows how to bring people together,” Breen said.

In her freetime, Desmond enjoys running, reading, watching films, going to the theater, and traveling. “She's a Wordle fanatic, that's for sure, along with her daughter. It makes sense since she loves the written word. We enjoy hiking together quite a bit. We spent one of our anniversaries climbing Mount Washington and staying at a hut up there…We also work out together. We go to a personal trainer, and we enjoy spurring each other on,” Unger said.

As a travel enthusiast, she often travels to places such as Nova Scotia, New York, New Mexico, and London to visit friends and family.“My family lives all over the place, so we often have to travel to see them,” Desmond said. 

When asked about the one thing she wished to know when she first came to Exeter, Desmond said she wished she had “branched outside” and “understood what Exeter is like beyond what you see downtown.” “I think that sometimes people here live within this little boarding school bubble and whatever preconceptions you bring to Exeter about what Exeter is like unless you go beyond... It's important to be part of the larger community, especially if you plan to stay in Exeter for a while,” Desmond said. 

Desmond’s tenderness and compassion that stays with her wherever she goes has not gone overlooked. “She genuinely cares about us and it shows. My favorite thing about her would be that I can go to her with any problem I have, and she’ll always have a solution that relieves my stress,” Virani continued, showing her appreciation for moments with Desmond and her puppy Rex, who Desmond takes around spreading joy. “I never fail to laugh around Ms. Desmond. I love hanging out with Rex and she has always brought him in when I’m feeling down. I’ve learned the ins and outs of Exeter thanks to her, I don’t feel like a stranger to campus.”