In a state plagued by poor health outcomes, one WV educator is transforming his classroom

by Mike Chalmers, West Virginia Watch
June 23, 2025

Derek Gallagher, a teacher at Martinsburg High School in Martinsburg, West Virginia, isn’t one to sugarcoat hard truths. He just wrapped up his 15th year at MHS — covering psychology, AP psych, sociology, contemporary studies and leadership. And within minutes of meeting him, you realize he is anything but a traditional educator. Which is exactly how he prefers it.

Originally from Pittsburgh, Gallagher arrived in the Eastern Panhandle to play basketball at Shepherd University — where he started from 2006-2010 — ultimately graduating with a degree in education. He also earned a master’s in curriculum and instruction from Shepherd while teaching at MHS after graduating. 

“When I first started teaching, it was a very traditional classroom: desks, chairs, chapter reviews, tests, notes, worksheets — the whole package,” he said. “I think I brought good energy, but that was all I knew. I thought that’s what worked — because that’s what I was told worked.” 

But a few years into teaching — and while pursuing his master’s — Gallagher started running into former students. He’d ask them about his courses, the material, the lessons. The answers often comprised vague memories, scattered impressions, no real retention.

“It really gave me pause,” he said. “These were good students — smart kids. But they couldn’t remember the core concepts. And I just thought, what are we doing in education if this is the result?”

It was a question he kept circling back to. He began looking more closely at what schools actually demanded of students. “They sit. They take notes. They regurgitate information. There’s not a ton of critical thinking — it’s mostly about finding the ‘right’ answer.”

Quoting philosopher and education reformer John Dewey — “You learn what you do” — he saw how disconnected the average classroom was from that principle. “We’re not doing. We’re pretending,” he said.

Around Gallagher’s fourth year, things began to shift. He enrolled in a course at Shepherd on the brain-body connection. The concept resonated deeply, especially with Gallagher’s background in athletics. Short bursts of high-intensity movement, he learned, weren’t just good for the body — they primed the brain for learning.

“They trigger the release of BDNF — brain-derived neurotrophic factor,” he said. “It’s basically Miracle-Gro for the brain.”

Even while still teaching in a traditional way, Gallagher began experimenting — adding in five-minute movement breaks before vocabulary lessons. For his master’s thesis, he tracked student performance. The results were clear: the group that engaged in high-intensity movement consistently outperformed the control group. 

“They remembered more. They engaged more. It was night and day.”

But Gallagher didn’t stop at movement. He started to examine everything — food, attention spans, addiction pathways, the pervasive glow of screens.

“We’re feeding these kids garbage — sugar bombs for breakfast, processed carbs throughout the day — and then asking them to sit still and pay attention. And on top of that, we give them screens and pretend it’s innovation.”

He cited a recent report showing how teens now average nearly nine hours a day on screens, with nearly zero regulation or structure around that time. 

“We’re not teaching kids to regulate dopamine — we’re helping them spike it all day long. And then we wonder why they’re anxious, distracted and disengaged.”

For Gallagher, it wasn’t enough to diagnose the problem. He wanted to rebuild the model entirely.

Quiet rebellion 

He started with subtle changes in the way he structured his classroom, built in movement, experimented with nontraditional methods. But the real catalyst, he said, was COVID.

“That’s when I saw the full dysfunction of the system. We were throwing a Band-Aid on a bullet wound. ‘Wear a mask. Stay six feet apart.’ But no one was talking about immune systems — about kids being vitamin D deficient, never moving, eating garbage and not sleeping.”

For Gallagher, the pandemic laid bare what had already been broken. 

“So I asked myself: What can I control?” He started holding class outside whenever possible. “That alone was a lightbulb moment — why do we have to be in a building to learn?”

What followed was a quiet but deliberate rebellion against the traditional classroom. Gallagher began rethinking not just what he was teaching, but how, where and why. He removed the rows of desks, opened the blinds to let in natural light, and turned off the fluorescents. “The modern classroom doesn’t have to be the default. Frankly, we’re not getting connection.  We’re just getting compliance.”

He also credits a rare stroke of fortune: an administration open to new ideas. “That’s not always the case,” he said. “If I’d been in a different county or a different state, this might’ve gone nowhere. Which would be extremely unfortunate because kids are really struggling today.”  

And it’s not because kids are broken, he affirmed. “It’s a natural response to the environment we’ve created. We can’t keep teaching like it’s 1992 — or even 2005. Everything about their world is different now. We’ve got to teach like we know that.”

Shift in consciousness

A decade and a half since he arrived at Martinsburg High, two things at this point ring undeniably unique about Gallagher’s approach to education: the garden and the workouts.  

Just beyond the edge of an ancient MHS tennis court, a once-forgotten patch of land has been transformed into something quietly radical: a living, breathing classroom. It’s part garden, part training ground, part sanctuary — and for Gallagher, it represents everything the modern education system has forgotten.

“We’re obsessed with convenience and immediacy,” he said. “And in some ways, that’s fine. But it also robs us of something deeply human — the process.”

The garden, he explained, is the perfect antidote to that mindset. A student drops a seed into the soil, and over time — with care, water, weeding and patience — it becomes food. But more than that, it becomes a mirror. “Learning is a process. Fitness is a process. Growth — literal or figurative — is a process,” he said. “And when you grow food, you’re participating in something ancient. You’re connected to the earth. You’re taking care of something outside yourself.”

He points out that gardening isn’t just about nutrition or sustainability — it’s also about healing. “For kids battling anxiety or depression, it’s incredibly grounding. You’re not fixated on your own stress. You’re thinking, ‘What does this plant need?’”

Every class Gallagher teaches spends time in the garden. If the weather holds (winter notwithstanding), they’re outside. Lessons are delivered from picnic tables or folding chairs, sometimes scribbled in chalk across the tennis court. A whiteboard lives in the garden shed. The outdoor space is as functional as any indoor classroom — and intentionally more alive.

The results aren’t measured in harvest volume. “We’re not growing enough to feed the community,” he said. “We’re growing enough to think differently about food. At the end of the day, if you care about kids, you have to care about what we’re feeding them — body and mind.”

It’s a shift in consciousness he’s after. “When students pull Swiss chard from the earth and take it home to cook, or sauté radishes in a pan right there in the classroom, something changes,” he said. He describes students crowding around fig trees and tomato plants like “a swarm of locusts,” devouring produce on the spot. “It’s immediate. It’s real. And it sticks with them.”

But the deeper lesson, he said, is about reverence. Gallagher borrows from Abraham Maslow’s idea of “resacralizing” the everyday — making food sacred again. “In every major spiritual tradition — Buddhism, Islam, Christianity — food is sacred,” he said. “There’s a sense of gratitude and presence that’s supposed to come with eating.”

Over the past few years, the garden has evolved from a passion project to a full-fledged school asset. Gallagher and his students have secured more than $12,000 in grant funding to expand the space. What began as a modest plot has grown into an interdisciplinary zone for both nourishment and movement — a space utilized by an additional 10 teachers at MHS. 

“We built it out as a true learning space,” he said. “And it wasn’t just me. Multiple teachers here have taken part — especially Mr. Cook, our Agriculture teacher. He’s been an enormous contributor to the cause. They all understand that it’s not just about food — it’s identity work. It’s recovery. It’s building purpose in young people.”

And while many school garden programs fade away after their first season, Gallagher’s continues to grow. “Because it’s not performative,” he said. “It’s part of the rhythm of what we do.”

As a result, the momentum has been steady. And the support has followed. What began with four raised beds and a grant from the Eastern Panhandle Conservation District has grown into a fully realized outdoor learning space supported by local organizations like Freedom’s Run and the Martinsburg Rotary Club, as well as larger national organizations like CrossFit. Gallagher estimates the garden and its extensions have brought in nearly $30,000 in funding to date.

Soon, the land surrounding the site will boast a fitness trail. The “Les Smith Fitness Trail,” named in honor of a beloved teacher and coach who passed away in 2022, will wind its way through the outskirts of the school property. 

“It’s for the students, but also the community,” Gallagher said. “We don’t have a public fitness trail in Berkeley County. This could change the landscape — literally and figuratively.”

The whole human

The workouts began with a simple idea: five minutes of movement could be one of the most effective uses of instructional time.

“Short bursts of physical activity trigger neurological engagement,” Gallagher said. “Students come back sharper, more focused, more connected — not just mentally, but socially and emotionally. It builds community.”

That premise evolved into a larger initiative he now calls MAA — Movement, Awareness, Adaptation. Once a month, his classroom becomes a training ground for something far beyond physical fitness. These aren’t typical gym sessions. They’re tests of effort, will and reflection. And they’re entirely voluntary.

“But the wild thing is,” he said, “even students who don’t participate physically still walk away with something. They see their classmates push through these brutal workouts — see them struggle, adapt, overcome. And afterward, they’ll say, ‘That taught me more than any PowerPoint ever could.’ That’s real learning. That’s peripheral learning — the stuff that sticks without you even realizing it.”

The MAA sessions are open to all of Gallagher’s classes. On those days, the garden transforms again. Community members might even drop in to participate. And Gallagher himself joins, moving with his students, sweating alongside them.

“When they see me doing it, it shifts something. I’m not just preaching effort — I’m modeling it. They see that this isn’t about PE or punishment. It’s about the whole human being.”

While the workouts might look like a detour from traditional instruction — especially to an outsider peeking in on a day when the entire period is dedicated to movement — Gallagher insists that’s part of the problem. 

“We’ve boxed in our idea of what counts as learning. If it’s not a worksheet or a note-taking session, we assume it doesn’t ‘count.’ But real education isn’t always measurable in real time. That’s why this model works — it meets students where they are. It teaches them to rise.”

Expanding the vision 

Fifteen years into his career, Gallagher now finds himself in a position he wouldn’t have anticipated when it began: public facing. In multiple appearances before the Berkeley County Board of Education, he has laid out a case that is as data-driven as it is impassioned: the school system is failing its students — not just academically, but physically, emotionally and socially.

“West Virginia has long ranked near the bottom nationally in categories like obesity, childhood diabetes, physical inactivity and access to fresh food,” he said. 

According to the CDC’s State of Childhood Obesity, nearly 37% of children ages 10–17 in West Virginia are overweight or obese — nearly quadruple what it was just 25 years ago. Gallagher doesn’t need statistics to recognize the problem. 

“We have this data, and yet the food schools serve remains laden with sugar and processed carbohydrates,” he said. “A typical breakfast can contain as much as 64 grams of added sugar, with donuts, chocolate milk, juice and flavored yogurt all considered ‘in compliance.’ We are essentially fueling the problem.”

While districts spend millions on iPads and Chromebooks, he said, there is little to no investment being made in initiatives that encourage physical activity, outdoor learning or in-person connection.

In contrast, he added, a growing body of research points to the benefits of movement and time spent outside, “… both of which can reduce anxiety and depression while improving cognitive function.” 

Among his proposals: eliminate juice and chocolate milk from school menus, educate teachers on simple movement-based interventions to use in class, invest in outdoor classrooms and gardens, and establish a standing health and wellness advisory board to help guide district policy based on current health data and real-world outcomes.

Most notably, Gallagher developed a dual-enrollment course with longtime wellness advocate Dr. Al Bacchus titled Love, Wellness, Happiness, and the Self-Examined Life. The class would offer students three college credits through Blue Ridge Community and Technical College in Martinsburg and include longitudinal tracking to assess the long-term impact on participants’ health and well-being. Despite being approved by the college, the course was denied by the BCBOE.

“If we’re not pursuing research-based health and wellness programs in schools, then what are we doing?” Gallagher asked. “We have to stop spending millions on tech while ignoring the actual bodies and minds of our students. Their future physical, emotional, psychological and economic well-being depends on the decisions we make right now.”

When asked about the future, Gallagher doesn’t talk about retirement or accolades. He talks about legacy.

“I hope when I’m done teaching, I can hand this thing off to someone else who will carry it forward,” he said. “This is going to take decades. But if we keep fighting, if we stay focused on quality of life, I believe we’ll look back at some point and say we really changed something.”

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West Virginia Watch is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. West Virginia Watch maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Leann Ray for questions: info@westvirginiawatch.com.