Teachers chosen to serve the country through Jury Duty

On Dec. 10, instead of teaching World History and US History classes, teacher Jim Chin fulfilled his civil obligations by serving jury duty.

“As a history teacher, I think jury duty is a vital part of participating in our democracy, and it’s absolutely our duty and our privilege as citizens,” said Chin, whose case ended on Dec. 12th. “It's an important and exciting opportunity for us. I was, however, really bummed that I was called the week before finals.”

Another teacher who was called to serve for jury duty near the end the semester was English 11 Honors/English 10 teacher Amy Keys.

Keys said she could feel everyone called for jury duty dreading the consequences of getting onto the jury, which was a murder case.

“The atmosphere was tense, because all of the potential jurors knew that it was slated to be an 8-10 week duty,” Keys said.

Chin said there are ways to get out of jury duty, even though the chances of even getting onto the jury are as low as 20 percent.

“Basically, in California jury trials we have a jury of 12. Twelve people from a pool of, in my case, around 60 people are called in to sit in the jury box,” Chin said. “We are asked as a group a series of questions to determine bias, and then asked a series of personal questions.”

“Along the way, you can be taken out of the jury box and replaced with a new jury if the defense or prosecution attorneys don't want you on their final jury,” Chin said.

Although Keys knew that it was mandatory to go, she admitted that she would have been hard pressed to serve during a lengthy trial.

“As much as I do want to do my civic duty and I believe in the jury system,” said Keys, “ I don't know of many people who can suspend their work and home life for quite that long a stretch.”

Luckily for Keys, she was excused from serving on the jury, and only had to miss two days of school, which ended up not hampering her lesson plans too much.

“I couldn't imagine how a  sub could have assessed final projects, many of which were performances, or carried out finals,” said Keys, “and I was fretting about how to come up with meaningful sub plans for the beginning of the year.”

“Luckily for me, I also have amazing colleagues who were able to help out, a great sub pool, and, of course, lovely students who can carry on learning when I'm gone,” said Keys.

Chin was admitted into the jury, but he says that he got  lucky with a short case.

“I was part of the first 12 people who were called, and they kept me on throughout the entire day and I wound up being part of the final jury,” Chin said. “However, Wednesday morning, right before we were about to hear opening statements, the two sides reached a settlement — otherwise, I would have been gone from SHS the entire week before final.”