John Donoughe has been teaching at State High for 31 years and has continuously been one of the most memorable teachers. He started out teaching Environmental Science and Earth Science, but for the last six years, he’s been teaching a course that he created called Survival Science. He is also the adviser of the Outing Club. His course teaches students a lot of survival skills as well as knowledge of nature and hands-on experiences.
Donoughe said that he wants to encourage his students to go on adventures, and to feel that they have accomplished challenging things.
“People want to feel like they’ve done something challenging. I think that’s why a lot of students look forward to the ‘Trial-By-Fire’ because it’s completely out of the ordinary. It’s something a lot of people see, on TV on different survival shows, and they want the chance to do it and feel like they’ve done something difficult,” Donoughe said.
Many of his lessons have hidden agendas, such as leadership, team building, and self-reliance, but Donoughe explained one of the most important takeaways from his course.
“People have survived in really, really terrible conditions and have made it through. We’re all gonna go through something difficult at some time. If you have these people and these stories, tucked away, and you say: ‘Man, but Shackleton was able to make it, and it was way tougher than what I’m going through’. It’s kind of inspiring,” Donoughe said.
Senior Tate Sanderson is taking the second survival course with Donoughe and explained his classroom manner.
“He’s pretty funny sometimes. He’s very, very determined. He’s always trying to get us to work to the best of our ability regardless, and he wants us to just practice all this stuff all the time,” Sanderson said.
His survival course has a very special tradition called the Trial-By-Fire. This is an end-of-the-course camping trip, with lots of fun challenges and survival-like conditions.
Donoughe shared a special memory from one of the Trial-By-Fires.
“I don’t get much sleep on the night of the trial by fire because I make my rounds throughout the night. But I was in the middle of my three or four hour nap, and I got a call on the radio. I think it was about 03:00 in the morning. ‘Eagle Base. Eagle Base. This is team Wounds.’ I’m trying to wake up. And I said, go ahead, team Wounds. He said: ‘you have to come and try some of our potatoes. These are the best food I’ve ever had’. [And I said:] ‘Don’t make me put my boots on and come over there.’ That was kind of funny. The team was so excited about the food that they were cooking, but I need some sleep,” Donoughe said.
Bob White, a physics teacher at State High who has known Donoughe since 2002 and co-advised Outing Club with him, shared a story in which Donoughe used his survival knowledge to save a student.
“We had been hiking in the forest at Monongahela National Forest in North Fork Mountain Trail, and a student had become overcome with heat exhaustion. So Mr. Donoughe took the lead, understanding basic first aid and made sure he got cooled down, was hydrated, and eventually the student was successfully able to finish the hike,” White said.
Donoughe goes on many trips outside of school and Outing Club, some of which are in extreme conditions. Some of his trips have required him to be in a survival-like situation. One time he was hiking with a friend in the Grand Canyon, when they encountered an unknown animal that blocked their way back to civilization, forcing them to stay the night even though they hadn’t prepared for it.
“We were able to start a fire. We boiled some water out of the creek. We had our little emergency blanket tarp shelter that we could use to reflect the heat back onto us. I had a couple of those little sitting pads that we could kind of get our bodies on for a little bit of cushioning. It was a very long and mostly sleepless night. But we had the stuff that we needed, we knew what to do, and we got through it,“ Donoghue said.
White shared the importance of Donoughe‘s role model for young people.
“In today’s era, the term masculinity has a negative connotation, some people refer to it as toxic. But Mr. Donoughe embodies being capable, self-reliant, independent, and all the qualities we used to admire in people throughout society. Basically, the type of people upon whom the country was built and things would happen. He’s a strong moral compass and is basically, a very capable man,” White said.
Donoughe is an important figure in the State High community who inspires others to explore the outdoors and push themselves to their limits. “I’ve always been pulled toward the outdoors,” he said, and he continues to share that love for the outdoors with everybody that surrounds him.
