James Supak is a National Board Certified physical education teacher at Zilker Elementary School. He teaches his students to live healthy lifestyles with compassion and is particularly motivated by a desire to prevent and treat childhood obesity.

Supak earned a master’s degree in exercise physiology from the University of Texas at Austin in 2004, and continues to work with the university to train physical education teacher candidates. He has worked at several AISD elementary school campuses since 2005.  

In addition, Supak serves as the co-president of the Austin Association for Physical Education and Recreation. He also worked with the National Association for Sport and Physical Education to develop curriculum standards to improve the quality and quantity of physical activity programs across the United States. 

Supak said that when he was a student, he was often bullied during physical education classes. Those experiences and the mentorship of his college professors shaped his desire to become an educator.

“Because of [Dr. Dolly Lambin], I began to realize that I didn’t want any child to go through the pain and embarrassment that I suffered in PE class,” Supak said.

Supak attributed his success as a teacher to his commitment to being a guardian to all his students, and working to ensure that “they will never have a negative PE experience at Zilker Elementary.”