His Story
Richard Knoeppel teaches architecture at Advanced Technologies Academy, a Title I magnet high school in Las Vegas, where he has been a founding faculty member since 1995. He began college as a mechanical engineering major, found it did not suit his learning style, and switched to industrial arts education at SUNY Oswego, where he earned both his bachelor’s and master’s degrees. His high school drafting teacher encouraged him to apply for his first teaching job. He taught technology education at Dell H. Robison Middle School before joining A-TECH.
His students learn through project-based design challenges built around local and national architecture competitions. They research ethnically diverse and historically significant neighborhoods across the country, present their ideas in class critiques and receive feedback from students and professionals in other schools and states. He avoids handing students his own answers to the design problem, and the class lives by the idea that “we will only be successful as individuals if we are successful as a classroom community.” Architects, engineers and builders from the community help teach in his room, and alumni come back each year to mentor the next group.
His principal says over 98 percent of his architecture students passed the Nevada architectural design end-of-program assessment over three years, and in 2016 the program became the first magnet program in Nevada to win an AdvanceCTE National Program of Excellence award, recognizing the top architecture program in the country. Parents and former students describe a teacher who notices when a student is struggling and individualizes his approach.
Beyond the Classroom
Knoeppel was named the 2019 Nevada Teacher of the Year and was a 2017 finalist. He was also the 2014 Magnet Schools of America Region VIII Teacher of the Year and was inducted into the Clark County School District Excellence in Education Hall of Fame in 2007. He has written grants, including a Verizon Innovative Learning grant for virtual reality, a Samsung Solve for Tomorrow grant, and a Project Management Institute STEM grant to build a solar-powered phone charger with students, and he has brought in software donations from Lumion and Enscape.
He has served on the Nevada STEM Advisory Council since 2013, and the council’s work helped lead to state legislation on STEM, STEM seals on diplomas and computer education standards. He is a member of the State Superintendent’s Teacher Advisory Cabinet and of the first Nevada Teach Plus Education Policy Fellowship cohort, where he helped write recommendations that became part of a bill draft request for the 2019 legislative session. He took part in a state study of teacher preparation programs, was in the first cohort of the Public Education Foundation’s Teacher Leadership Academy, and was chosen by colleagues to chair his school’s organizational team.
Philosophy Into Practice
Knoeppel uses diagnostic, formative and summative assessments, along with rubric-driven peer critiques and self-assessment, which he says are closer to how architects receive feedback. Each spring his department analyzes results, keeps what works and rewrites what does not into a vertically aligned plan. Feedback from professionals who mentor student design projects helps keep his curriculum current.
He names school funding and the attraction and retention of strong teachers as Nevada’s most serious problems. He has worked with a coalition on the state’s school funding formula and on career pathways that let teachers advance without leaving the classroom.
“I want to provide them with the ability to be successful in jobs and careers that haven’t been thought of yet.”Richard Knoeppel
In His Own Words
“My classroom is a collaborative community.”Richard Knoeppel
“We will only be successful as individuals if we are successful as a classroom community.”Richard Knoeppel
“I believe that assessment data should drive instruction and that the types of assessments should fit the career path that students are pursuing.”Richard Knoeppel
What Others Said
“Richard Knoeppel is an exceptional educator.”Onia Holmes-Sutton, nominator, colleague
“Mr. Knoeppel embodies the concept of a teacher leader, as he has been a catalyst for positive, student-focused change at the school, district and state-level.”Jonathan Synold, principal, Advanced Technologies Academy
“Richard is a natural leader who impacts every student that comes into his classroom.”Jeanine Roser, colleague, West Career and Technical Academy
“Mr. Knoeppel is one of the few teachers I have come across that has been gifted with the ability to individualize his teaching methods to suit each student in the best possible way.”Nola Patterson, parent of former students
“He built an environment where I felt like I could fail and absolutely learn something from it.”Andrew K. Shepherd, former student