Green + Gold = Math Everyone Loves
Next game: Sunday, January 20
NFC Championship vs. NY Giants
Countdown to Gameday at 12:00 p.m. on Newsradio 620 WTMJ
"Okay, who here is excited that the Packers might have a chance to go to the Super Bowl?" asks Whitnall Middle School teacher Mike Seavert.
"Yeeeeeahhhh!" scream dozens of students in his accelerated math class. "Go Packers!!!"
"Now, the last time the Packers were in the Super Bowl was on January 25th, 1998. If they win this Sunday, then they get to go to Super Bowl XLII on February 3rd. Who can tell me how many days are in between?"
As nearly every hand in the room shoots up, it becomes clear that this isn't a typical start to fourth period, but then again, Mr. Seavert isn't your typical teacher. Dressed in green and gold from toe to head (which is usually covered with a foam Lambeau Field hat) he cheerfully admits that he may be a little obsessed.
"When I got to Whitnall Middle five years ago," he recalls, "I finally had a classroom of my own where I could express my love of the Packers and the rest, I guess, is history."
Today, walking into Room 110 feels like walking through the tunnel of Lambeau South, with pennants, posters, streamers, and Brett Favre caricatures stretching from chalkboard to chalkboard.
"This week we even put in a special 'Thank You' sign to the Giants for not forcing us to play in Dallas," Seavert says. "And of course we have a donation bin for Terrell Owens that you can put Kleenex in in case he has to do another press conference!"
His unabashed excitement is undeniably contagious.
"I think it's pretty cool [that we have Packer-themed lessons]," says student Jon Drew. "They're my favorite team!"
"It just gets us pumped up for the games and everything," adds classmate Mikaela Nowak. "It's just, like, a lot of fun."
"We have a lot of kids here who watch the football games," Seavert explains. "It's something they can connect to. It just makes things a little more fun and exciting around here. We don't have to make math or school in general boring."
Beneath the fandom, though, lies a challenging lesson that perplexed one reporter who still adds and subtracts on his fingers.
"We know that this year's Super Bowl will kick off at 5:18 pm and we're pretty sure that this one will start at the same time. Who can tell me how many hours are in between?" Mr. Seavert asks. A dozen hands shoot into the air before Michael Gruszka bravely walks to the front of the class to give his answer and explain how he came to it.
"Well, it's been 3,658 days and we know there are 24 hours in a day, so I just multiplied them and I got 87,792 hours," he explains.
"Very good!" replies Mr. Seavert. "Now who can tell me how many minutes?"
"5,267,520," is Sam Hushek's quick answer.
Let's see...3 million....carry the two.... We'll just have to take their word for it.
"We do have curriculum to follow here at school and that's my top priority," Seavert says. "But anytime that I can incorporate the Packers into it I do. It's not every day of the week. I try to keep it in moderate."
He's about as moderate as can be expected from someone who drives a green Pack-mobile with a license plate reading "PKR-MTH" ("Packer Math," get it?), but insists that even his insatiable appetite for Packer-backing will always take a backseat to learning.
"I think the Packer lessons are great," says Whitnall Middle School principal Lynn Stadler. "It's meaningful because there are a lot of kids here who are fans and it kind of brings out a relationship between the math principles and what's going on in the real world."
In that world?
"Oh, the Packers will win on Sunday," Seavert predicts, adding that no complex mathematical formula is needed to figure that one out. "They're just the better team. They're the best team."
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