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Date: 4/26/2022
NORTHAMPTON – Armand Lamour, a plumbing instructor at Smith Vocational and Agricultural High School, was recently recognized as the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) District 7 Teacher of the Year, as well as the runner-up for VFW State Teacher of the Year.
According to Lamour, the award is given to teachers who promote American history and the traditions and values associated and aligned with the VFW.
“Being a vocational school, it’s a little bit less traditional than somebody who is a history teacher or social studies teacher,” said Lamour, when reflecting on what the award represents. “We still try to create a shop environment where we respect the rights, opinions, and beliefs of others in alignment with the VFW responsibilities.” When asked about his initial reaction to receiving these awards, Lamour said the experience overall was “pretty cool.”
“My dad actually works for the VFW, so he’s the one who came to the school with some of the other guys who broke the news to me … they did it at a faculty meeting,” he said. “It was neat to receive the award with all of my co-workers at the school.”
Lamour, who has been a plumbing instructor for eight years at Smith, told Reminder Publishing that students who are part of the plumbing program typically start out freshman and sophomore year learning about basic plumbing principles before taking on more advanced projects in their upper class years, like venting and piping methods for different bathroom and fixture layouts.
Before becoming one of three plumbing instructors at Smith, Lamour – who is a Smith alum – worked for a residential company in Belchertown. After being laid off at his job, Lamour went to substitute teach for a few days at Smith and ended up loving it. Once a position opened, he went through the interview process and officially became a full-time instructor.
COVID-19 was a difficult time for the plumbing program, according to Lamour, especially because much of the teaching is very hands-on. “With the school shut down, we had to go remote, which is not an easy thing to teach over computers,” said Lamour. “It’s the sort of thing you have to put your hands on. But myself, and the other instructors, tried to think outside the box. We had the kids sketch out their dream house, and then take a material list for their house, and we would go over it on Zoom.”
Aside from being a day-to-day plumbing instructor, Lamour is also heavily involved as a leader in the SkillsUSA competition, which he describes as the Olympics for vocational students around the state and country. According to Lamour, the plumbing students at Smith typically do “exceptionally well,” and in recent years, the instructor has been able to take a student to Abu Dhabi and another to Russia to compete in the world competition. Currently, the program also has two students competing in the state competition. The winner of that will have a chance to go down to Atlanta for nationals.
Lamour told Reminder Publishing that he attributes his success to the students at Smith. “We get really good kids,” said Lamour. “We get students who want to learn, and it makes our job a lot easier. We don’t have to chase the kids to feed them the knowledge. They come to us to ask the appropriate questions.”