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ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥œEducation is such a collaborative and community process. ItÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™s not done in isolation. So I owe this award to so many teachers, so many mentors, so many students that IÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™ve had over the past because IÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™ve taken something from each of them that IÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™ve brought back to make myself the teacher that I am here today,ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥� Riazi told The Herald-Dispatch.

The PAEMST is the highest award by the United States government for K-12 science, technology, engineering, math or computer science teaching, according to a news release. Awardees were chosen based on both their teaching abilities and dedication to improving STEM education.

Awardees were given a certificate signed by President Joe Biden, a ceremony in Washington, D.C., and a $10,000 grant from the National Science Foundation.

Riazi was also selected in 2020 to be in the first cohort of a group of teachers called the Mountaineer Mathematics Master Teachers (M3T) composed of educators representing 30 county school districts across the state.

He is a National Board Certified Teacher and was honored as a Computer Science Teachers Association National Educator Award recipient and a multiple-time National Center for Women and Information Technology award winner.

Joanna Burt-Kinderman, a leader of M3T, said she has watched Riazi over the past five years learn from other teachers in his cohort and give them ideas, measure out how it works with his students and grow.

Burt-Kinderman said, not only have RiaziÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™s students benefited from his teaching abilities, but educators all over the state have learned from him, too. She said while Riazi is well-adept at statistics, a skill needed in many professional areas, he chose to be a teacher, and teachers like him deserve to be uplifted.

Although Riazi has been in the classroom for about 18 years, with nearly seven at Cabell Midland, he jokes that heÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™s an ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥œaccidental teacher.ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥�

Riazi started as a pre-med major at Marshall University, but eventually switched to math with the advice of a professor and attended a semester at architecture school. After graduating, he wrote wine lists for restaurants for a while until someone eventually suggested becoming a teacher.

ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥œThereÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™s a group of teachers that you can tell that were born to teach, and Adam Riazi is one of those,ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥� Associate Principal Kelly Daniels said. ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥œYou can see how kids gravitate to him, gravitate to his teaching style, and how they perform to every expectation that he sets forth for them. ItÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™s really amazing as an administrator to sit back and watch all of those things happen.ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥�

Riazi began both of his early classes on Tuesday, computer science and Advanced Placement statistics, by engaging with students as soon as they came through the door. He then started asking his students a series of questions about a subject or a scenario he prompted them with, leading them into the agenda for the day.

ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥œKids are real people,ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥� Riazi said. ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥œIÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™ve always treated all my students with respect and with a value of their lived experience and their perspective. ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥¦ You have to know how to communicate and make people feel comfortable and open and ready to learn from you before you know you could ever teach difficult concepts like AP statistics or AP calculus.ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥�

Something RiaziÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™s colleague across the hall, math teacher Michael Harshbarger, said she first noticed about RiaziÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™s classroom was that his desks were always set up in groups instead of columns so students could collaborate.

ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥œYou just canÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™t get more passionate about being a math educator than him,ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥� Harshbarger said, explaining that Riazi has always been a resource for feedback and ideas for teaching.

ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥œWhen I was a new teacher, you had the pacing guides and the curriculum and all these other things that youÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™re supposed to go by. And he was very adamant that, if your kids arenÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™t ready, donÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™t move on. ItÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™s what your kids need,ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥� she said.

Riazi said he always tries to gauge his class on how well theyÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™re learning content and provides multiple opportunities for them to grasp a subject other than quizzing them.

Overall, Riazi said what heÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™s learned from teaching high school students over the years is itÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™s ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥œnot a performance.ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥�

ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥œItÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™s not something that you rehearse over and over and over again until everything goes exactly like you thought. ItÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™s more improv than it is theater,ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥� he said. ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥œYou have to be willing to bomb a lesson, and then go back and revisit it and learn what you did right, learn what you did wrong and take it in a different direction.ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥�

Several of RiaziÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™s AP statistics students described him as ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥œamazing,ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥� ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥œencouraging,ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥� ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥œunderstandingÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥� and ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥œhelpful.ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥�

Senior Anna Elkins, 18, had Riazi as a teacher for the past couple of years, but one moment sticks out to her.

ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥œLast year, when we were in trig, IÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™ve always struggled with doing circles. IÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™ve hated circles since sixth grade, when I first learned about them,ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥� Elkins said. ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥œHe genuinely took something that I disliked and made it so easy for me to understand.ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥�

Senior Bella Chapman, 18, remembered struggling with RiaziÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™s unit test for the first semester of this year, but with practice and his consistent help, she was confident in the final test.

Senior MJ Daniels, 18, works while also going to school and is often busy.

She said of Riazi, ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥œIÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™ve never met somebody thatÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥™s just so understanding. ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥¦ He understands that we have personal lives, normal lives, and we have other things going on, and he helps us work around it and still helps us do our best in the class itself.ÃÛÁÄÖ±²¥�