Maribel Johnson is most commonly known around these parts as Se ñ ora Johnson, the Perry-Lecompton high school Spanish teacher. Johnson has been teaching at PLHS for nine years now, and is the current sponsor of International Club.

“International Club has been great. We go on an international trip every year or two and we sponsor a lot of fun activities like the Halloween Dance, the dinner theater, and Café Cabaret,” said Johnson.

Johnson began her journey to teaching by attending Kansas University , the University of Colorado , and the Universidad Autonoma de Guadalajara. She then spent a year and two summers in Guadalajara , Mexico , studying the language and culture. “I was really good at it; I enjoyed it, and they kept offering me scholarships,” said Johnson when referring to her inspiration to teach.

She taught at five colleges and two high schools before settling in at Perry-Lecompton for nearly the past decade.

When asked what has been the greatest aspect of teaching, Johnson replied “I am fairly immature… Because you can do some strange stuff while teaching foreign language, I have been able to indulge my inner child!”

Outside of the classroom, Johnson has had “a lot of opportunities to travel and to work as a translator in some really cool situations.” For example, she has translated in court for arrests, arraignments, interrogations, depositions, trials, etc . Johnson went on to say that she “usually [translates for] drugs and drunk driving [offenses], and once [because] a child was kidnapped by a Spanish speaker.” She also just translated a play that will be performed by a children's theater next year in Kansas City . Johnson has also reaped many benefits from her special ability to speak Spanish.

Some of those benefits would include the opportunity to teach her own children the language. Both of her sons are fluent, and “they used to love to go on vacation and make fun of their dad because everyone knew what was going on, but him, [who only] knows four sentences,” said Johnson.

In conclusion, “my subject is fun in that people come into my classroom brand new,” Johnson said. She went on to say “most know how to count to ten, and then we have a new subject. We can sing, dance, play games and still learn a lot. Students get a sense of accomplishment because they learn to do something that other people cannot. It also opens us up to new experiences here in the middle of the United States .”