A shortened year in the classroom for COVID, a year made up mostly of Distance Learning, and a year that started with mask — those are the three years that Mr. Javier Zaragosa has been teaching PE at Armijo. “I taught previously at Fairfield High School and in the Travis Unified School District,” he said. Obviously, COVID made teaching PE challenging.

He hasn’t always been a teacher. “I have worked in retail, solar installation, gyms, and restaurants,” said Mr. Zaragosa, but he became a teacher because he wanted to better the community in which he grew up, improve the society in the present and the future, and “most importantly, CHANGE THIS CITY!”

If he could change something about Armijo, it would be that more students developed a stronger work ethic, and that would help improve the area overall.

Mr. Zaragosa developed his own strong work ethic over the course of his education, but he did not attend Armijo. He graduated from Vanden, where he played football since his freshman year. He then went to play football at Los Medanos Junior College in Pittsburg. As a junior, he played at Whittier College, and finished up his college education playing for California Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks.

In addition to playing football, he also enjoys coaching it. He spends some of his free time watching sports and working out, bowling, eating, hiking and more. He has family all over California as well as relatives in Arizona and Minnesota.