“I enjoy teaching a student and seeing them use the language. When you open yourself to travel and other people, you’re improving yourself, and you’re learning so much more than you are used to in your own country.”

Richard Karrat can carry on a conversation in five languages — Arabic, French, Spanish, Italian, and English — but this is what speaks volumes about him:   

“I always was passionate about world languages and culture and history and meeting other people,” he says as he sits in his office in Founders Hall. “I wanted to get a job that had to do with languages and culture. So when I started teaching, it was about the content — but I stayed because of the kids.”

Richard has been teaching since graduating from Hamilton College in 2012 with a concentration in world politics and French and a minor in Arabic. He was a Fulbright Scholar, spending a year teaching English at Philadelphia University in Amman, Jordan. He taught world languages at the Pingry School in New Jersey from 2013 to 2019 and at Greenwich Country Day School for a year before coming to Loomis Chaffee in 2020. Richard teaches all levels of Arabic as well as French and Spanish at Loomis. He earned a master’s degree in Arabic language and literature in 2018 from Middlebury.

Richard describes his students as curious, resilient, and eager to learn.

“Students have told me they have enjoyed my class because I have high standards and am demanding, but I like to make it fun for them as well,” Richard says. He says he wants his students to be engaged and comfortable in the classroom, at times working together in groups. “I also try to make the curriculum such that they can use the language in real-life situations.”

Some of those real-life situations arise out of another role he has on campus. He is the director of the Global & Environmental Studies Certificate program. The certificate recognizes coursework, co-curricular engagement, and experiential learning and is part of the programming in the Alvord Center for Global & Environmental Studies. Richard has accompanied students on many International Education Program trips organized by the Alvord Center.

“I enjoy teaching a student and seeing them use the language,” he says. “When you open yourself to travel and other people, you’re improving yourself, and you’re learning so much more than you are used to in your own country.”

Richard is passionate about teaching Arabic, not a common language taught in high schools in the United States. He also is the founding advisor to the Middle Eastern affinity group on campus. “I’m Lebanese and Syrian,” he said. “My family is from the Middle East. I grew up hearing the language. I spent the year in Jordan. I studied Arabic at Middlebury. The language is part of my culture and identity, and when I teach Arabic, I feel it is a part of me.”

He also says the Arabic program provides “the opportunity to learn about people of the world that are easily misunderstood and the cultures of the Middle East and North Africa. There are so many different cultures, religious and ethnic groups, a lot of diversity.” 

Part of the beauty of Arabic, says Richard, is the unique combination of letters, sounds, and idioms. “The expressions used in Arabic are unique,” Richard says, “and all these idiomatic expressions have a response. When someone serves you a meal, you say [in Arabic], ‘God bless your hands.’ The response is, ‘May God put peace upon you.’ All languages have idioms, but Arabic takes it to the next level. I think students enjoy learning them, and for native speakers to hear Americans use these expressions shows we are trying to teach students more than the basic language.”

Richard says he also has learned from his students.

“As with students, I have high expectations of myself, but I can make mistakes, and they can make mistakes. No one is perfect,” Richard says. “And I have learned you have to meet students where they are. We have to have high standards but recognize what is going on in the students’ lives.”

Richard describes himself as a history buff and someone who enjoys travel, including day trips, and trying new restaurants. His favorite Middle Eastern dish is stuffed grape leaves, and he also calls himself “an Italian foodie.” He enjoys time with his fellow teachers outside of school. “We treat each other more like family than just colleagues,” he says.

That is a welcome feeling in any language.