After helping establish the golf program at Rockingham Middle School, a local man will now have the chance to teach and coach the sport at a Greenville private school.

Christopher S. McDonald, a 1985 Richmond Senior High School graduate, has accepted a teaching and coaching position with The Oakwood School in Greenville. McDonald has been teaching for six years.

McDonald, who started his teaching career at Rockingham Middle School, will teach four sections of English at Oakwood. He will teach two sections of eighth grade English, tenth and eleventh grade English, and a twelfth-grade Academically Gifted section of English.

McDonald will also be the school’s golf coach, a position that he helped start at Rockingham Middle School in 2002.

McDonald also attended Richmond Community College, where he earned an Associate in Arts degree. He earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Creative Writing degree from St. Andrews Presbyterian University, and supplemented that with a Master of arts in Englishg degree from East Carolina University in 2007.

McDonald stayed around Greenville after graduating from ECU, and taught at Snow Hill in 2007-2008. He also taught at Vanceboro in 2008.

McDonald said he has a passion for learning in the class room as well as on the golf course.

But he said he will focus on the students scholarly habits more than golf.

“I would be happier if my athletes were scholar-athletes, rather than winning every golf match that we were part of,” McDonald said.

McDonald attributes his stance on his athletes to Skip Holtz saying to his players at ECU, “Students first, athletes second.”

As far as what the future may hold for him, McDonald said, “I want to progress through the educational system in North Carolina. One day I want to teach at a college or a university, and then maybe return to teach at Richmond County.”

Contact sports reporter Travis Anderson at 997-3111 ext. 44, or via e-mail at tanderson@yourdailyjournal.com