At the end of the 2025-26 school year, science teacher Polly Martin will retire, leaving GDS after a 22-year tenure. As a final farewell, we sat down with Martin and discussed her life, career and retirement in the Bit’s third “In-Depth Deliberation”—this time with a legend in the science office.
Q: What do you plan to do after you retire?
“Oh good God,” Martin replied. “Are you ready for this?” We cautiously agreed.
“I have a trip to Mongolia planned, where I’m going to be looking for snow leopards, Pallas cats and camels,” she said. “Then, three weeks later, we’re gonna go to Japan, and we’re looking at possibly going to Jamaica.” But after her trips, Martin said, beaming, this summer will be one of the first for which she will be home. “I get to work on my garden, and I’m going to be doing photography; I’m going to have time to actually be cooking.”
Q: Is there anything you want to share about your garden?
“My garden is a little haphazard,” Martin said. She motioned to her desk in the science office. “If you see my desk, you probably know I don’t have anything in my life that looks nice, neat, organized.”
Q: How has seeing different cultures and seeing the way people learn in other places impacted your teaching style?
Martin enthusiastically said that when she goes to Mongolia this summer, there will be no running water. “There’s more than likely it’s going to be a pit toilet,” she said, “and they will probably have a tub of water that they hook up to a faucet so there is running water, but there’s a very limited supply.”
Then, Martin hesitated and asked, “What was the question?”
She gave another example: “The majority of the world focuses on memory-based learning, and if you are not a memorizer, they do not necessarily value you.”
She told a story about her time growing up in Greece, when her school forced all students to memorize and present poetry. “I was shamed over and over and over again because I couldn’t do it,” she said.
“We have people who do well with memorization, and we have people who do well with problem-solving, and, truthfully, you need both skills,” Martin said. “I actually like teaching in the U.S. because I think we have one of the widest varieties of teaching styles in the world.”
Q: What is your favorite travelling story?
“Most of [the stories] are like, ‘This is going to end in tragedy,’” Martin said, describing some of her more harrowing adventures.
Martin gleefully told us about one such occasion: She was hiking on a muddy path in Borneo—an island in Asia—when she slipped. As she fell, she turned around and attempted to stabilize herself by grabbing onto a root. The root broke.
Martin fell, backflipping roughly ten feet down the hill. Her shoes flew off, and she landed on her back. “I was really, really lucky because I missed all the trees, and I missed all the rocks,” Martin said, “and I only broke one camera filter.” Martin found her shoes, and her group continued on their hike.
Q: How many pets do you have?
“I have four cats because one moved out on me,” Martin said, “and now I have three dogs.”
That unfaithful cat “moved out” after Martin adopted two of her other cats. According to Martin, those two cats “bullied” the cat out of the house, and he moved into a neighbor’s house.
But Martin’s cats aren’t her only pets with a strange origin story.
While searching for rescue Bernese Mountain Dogs to adopt, Martin found a shelter in Kentucky that had just what she was looking for.
To confirm the legitimacy of the shelter, Martin began to search for reviews online. During her search, Martin came across a Reddit post accusing the shelter of being a front for a religious cult. According to the post, the shelter leader traveled around the country spreading her doctrine: Angels inhabit cats’ bodies, so to survive the apocalypse, you must adopt and care for as many cats as possible. The shelter also puts dogs up for adoption.
“Before you send money and [adopt a pet], you might want to check some reviews,” Martin warned.
But roughly two weeks ago, Martin decided to adopt her dogs anyway—from that same shelter. “When you get a chance to adopt a religious cult animal, you do it,” she said. “How many chances do you get to do this?”
Q: Taking care of an animal with a hard past can be difficult. Is there any way you’ve been able to relate that to teaching?
“Okay, this is gonna get me in trouble,” Martin said, “but I’m gonna just say the following: I tell my kids that what has influenced my teaching is dog obedience class, because when you do dog obedience, you give clear commands, and every once in a while that’s what kids need.”
Martin said she only adopts rescue animals. “That means they all have pasts, so you have to read their body language,” Martin said. “In teaching, every year you’re getting new students. You have to read their body language.”
Q: Do you have a favorite pet? If so, which one?
“Yes, there is ‘Garfield,’ who’s also known as ‘Butterball’ and also known as ‘Little Napoleon’,” Martin said. “He is a pain in the neck, but he’s probably most like me in personality.”
Martin said the different nicknames—Butterball and Little Napoleon—represented the cat’s different personalities. The cat is called Little Napoleon when he’s cranky and annoying, and Butterball when he’s hungry.
Sometimes, he’s both: “He’ll sit on the counter,” she said, “because he wants to be fed all the time, and every time I walk by, he will slap me.”
Q: You said his name is Napoleon, but then you also said that you were most similar to him. Are you similar to Napoleon?
“Nope,” Martin said. “He just wants to control everything. I do not share that personality with him.”
Q: To which nickname of his do you relate the most?
“Butterball, right now,” she said.
Q: Do you have a motto for teaching?
“Do I have a motto? I don’t think I have a motto,” Martin said, “but what’s important for me is that 70 minutes is a long period of time, so I like to have times [in class] where we’re learning, then times when students can diverge.
“I like [students] to learn how to think critically and ask questions. We’re not judging you on whether or not it’s a stupid question or not, because there are stupid questions.”
Martin emphasized that point. “I want them to learn that they can survive being wrong.”
Q: Lastly, how do you want to be remembered in the GDS community?
“I think that when you go, I don’t think you need to always be remembered,” Martin said.
“I live my life; I know who I am; I know people laugh at me and sometimes laugh with me, but I don’t actually think I’m remarkable, to be honest. But I will say this: I do think I’m different, and maybe that makes me remarkable.”