Theodor Christian Petersen Haagaas | |
|---|---|
 Theodor Haagaas, 1911 | |
| Born | 15 June 1873 |
| Died | 25 December 1961 (aged 88) |
| Resting place | Vestre gravlund 59°55′55″N 10°42′06″E / 59.931924°N 10.701681°E |
| Nationality | Norwegian |
| Occupation(s) | Mathematics educator and private school owner |
| Awards | King's Medal of Merit in Gold (1949) |
Theodor Christian Petersen Haagaas (15 June 1873, Tistedalen – 25 December 1961, Oslo) was a Norwegian mathematician, mathematics educator and private school owner.
He was the founder and owner of the Haagaas School, a private gymnasium at Frogner, Oslo that existed 1915–1955. Haagaas School was Norway's best known intensive gymnasium or "student factory" (Norwegian: studentfabrikk) in the first half of the 20th century, in the tradition of the historical Heltberg School of the 19th century; the noted educator Mosse Jørgensen wrote that "if any school had deserved the epithet 'The New Heltberg', it was Haagaas School."[1] He was also a co-owner of Frogner School and Nissen's Girls' School, and taught mathematics at Frogner School for nearly half a century. He was the author of the widely used Haffner og Haagaas series of textbooks in mathematics, which was published between 1925 and 1979 in dozens of editions and which was the most widely used series of mathematics textbooks in Norway for a large part of the 20th century.
He was described as a distinctive and unconventional teacher with a keen sense of humor, and as the country's best-known mathematics educator. Upon his passing, he was described by Aftenposten as "a very widely known Norwegian educator."[2] He received the King's Medal of Merit in Gold in 1949 for his services to education in Norway.[3] Among his four daughters was the humanist and resistance fighter Henriette Bie Lorentzen.