Teacher awarded for work outside classroom

Overlook Middle School social studies teacher Brett Duncan, a Sterling firefighter, was honored with the Martin H. McNamara Award in April.

Duncan received the honor at the graduation ceremony on April 4 for the Massachusetts Firefighting Academy's Call/Volunteer Firefighter Training Class. He earned the award by achieving the highest-class levels in both academic and practical skills applications.

Duncan has lived in Sterling since 2006.

The Martin H. McNamara Award is the highest achievement for the class. The award honors Lancaster call-firefighter Martin H. McNamara, who died while fighting a building fire in 2003, and is given to the most outstanding student in each graduating class of the call/volunteer training program.

The call/volunteer firefightertraining curriculum is designed to train and evaluate students in the basic skills of the fire fighting profession. The course, demanding both academically and physically, is oriented towards call and volunteer fire departments and it is built around a nationally recognized curriculum of Firefighter I and II training standards.

The Massachusetts Firefighting Academy conducts this class on a regional basis with standardized training taught to students from several fire departments. The program generally runs over the course of six months and prepares graduates for the Firefighter I/II Certification Examination.