Besides being a master plumber, Stephen Sensabaugh, owner of Potomac Plumbing in Cumberland, Maryland, is a certified plumbing instructor. He taught at Montgomery College while working in Washington, D.C., for the Association of Builders and Contractors. He says he enjoyed teaching and misses being in the classroom.
“I saw a flyer on my boss’s desk when I was at Leisure World saying that the college was looking for experienced plumbers to teach,” he recalls. “They wanted at least a journeyman’s license and I had my master’s license, so that was no problem. I applied there and got the job. This meant that I worked during the day at Leisure World and taught at Montgomery College two nights a week.”
Sensabaugh liked to mix theory and reality in his teaching approach.
“For instance, I’d explain to my students what a ball valve is for and which applications it is used for, focusing on the concept rather than details like specific size or anything else that might be confusing,” he says. “Then I’d show them an actual ball valve and pass it around the classroom so that they could link the theory with the reality in their minds. And to me, that’s one of the best ways to teach somebody because first they’ve learned about it and now they’ve seen it in their hands.”
Additionally, Sensabaugh liked to teach his plumbing students the value of being honest.
“Sometimes, in front of the class I would make a mistake and then the students would point it out,” he says. “When this happened, I always made a point of saying, ‘You’re right. I’m not perfect.’ Also, if they had a question that I could not answer, I would look it up for them or go to another master plumber or even a code plumbing inspector to see if I could find the answer for them. Doing this allowed me to teach them better and boost my knowledge at the same time.”
Read more about Potomac Plumbing in the February 2026 issue of Cleaner magazine.
