Anastasia Forquer is a newcomer to Centreville’s English Department. Ms. Forquer graduated from George Washington University with a double major in English and Spanish Literature and studied at the University of Miami School of Law. She has always loved to read and write, English has always been her favorite subject, and she finds working with students to be an enjoyable experience.

I asked Ms. Forquer what she finds most important or fundamental about teaching English — What does she hope to impress, above all else, upon the students she will get to know throughout the year? Strong writing skills, she said, are fundamental. She wants to teach her students to be able to read different texts and relate them to themselves and the world in general; this process of relating, she remarked, helps those studying English appreciate different perspectives.

Ms. Forquer believes that learning English can enable students to appreciate a variety of different kinds of literature. The ideas and themes in these multitudinous volumes all sort of congeal together: the themes we study in the literature of particular historical periods and countries connect and intersect across cultures, time, and space.

When she’s not teaching English, Ms. Forquer enjoys music and dance, but she reads in her free time as well. Her favorite writer is Shakespeare, and her favorite play is Romeo and Juliet. She also likes Brontë’s Wuthering Heights. She enjoys experiencing the development and mutual interactions between literary characters.