Introducing the New Regional Teachers of the Year!

     December has been a whirlwind of travel, stepping into one school after another to make the Regional Teacher of the Year announcements.  The experience of making these announcements has truly been a highlight for me this year.  The announcements are such a great way to feel like I am "paying it forward" and to personally thank nine outstanding educators in our state.  I also had the opportunity to be reunited with some of my Teacher of the Year friends and Regional Teacher of the Year team members as I made the announcements.

     While making the surprise announcements, I got to travel across our state, often spending the night or stopping in small, rural towns that I probably never would have visited otherwise.  I got to meet incredibly kind North Carolinians along the way, many outstanding educators, the families of the Regional Teachers of the Year, and of course, the new Regional Teachers of the Year!  They often thanked me for "driving all that way just to make the announcement," but I would not have had it any other way.  You see, a year ago when Darcy Grimes, NC Teacher of the Year 2012-2013, showed up at Grimsley High School to announce that I was the new Region 5 Teacher of the Year, my life changed.  I am so honored to be able to change the lives of other teachers in our state. 

      Furthermore, the different way that each school chooses to make the surprise announcement gave me a great feel for the personalities of some of the schools across our state.  When my announcement was made, my principal took me to our central office for a staged meeting concerning a book challenge while half of our school assembled in the auditorium.  I had to go through with my presentation at the meeting, and when returned to Grimsley High School, I walked onto a darkened stage and the house lights went up to reveal the faces of my family, students, and coworkers cheering for me.  It was truly a moment I will never forget!  This year I made the announcements at Winter Celebration assemblies, assemblies for mock guest speakers on topics like bullying and local history, pep rallies, a fire drill with a flash mob dance party, a reward assembly following a speech by the mayor of Charlotte, and at an assembly after Santa Claus interrupted the superintendent of Rowan-Salisbury Schools.  Each announcement ended with the naming of a new Regional Teacher of the Year, and I loved seeing the celebrations of the school communities and the teachers' loved ones. 

      Below are the nine new Regional Teachers of the Year.  To find out a little more about them, you can check out the links to my Teacher of the Year Facebook account for a brief description and additional pictures.  Congratulations to each new Regional Teacher of the Year!  They are such an amazing group of educators, and I am so excited about the year ahead of them!

Northeast Region 1, Charlene Evans, Math Teacher, Plymouth High School:
https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=377285819073648&id=308452419290322

Pam Mills, Region 1 TOY 2012-2013 on the Left; Charlene Evans in the Center

Southeast Region 2, Melissa Gillespie, Social Studies Teacher, Laney High School:
https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=374141122721451&id=308452419290322



North Central Region 3, Rhonda Holmes, Visual Arts Teacher, Conway Middle School:
https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=377288242406739&id=308452419290322

A Student Who Read a Letter Congratulating Ms. Holmes and Lt. Col. Thomas McGeachy, Region 3 TOY 2012-2013 on the Right

Sandhills/South Central Region 4, Everlene Davis, Family and Consumer Science Teacher, South Columbus High School:
https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=376751475793749&id=308452419290322

  



Piedmont-Triad/Central Region 5, Kathy Saunders, English Teacher, Asheboro High School:
https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=374269459375284&id=308452419290322

Kathy Saunders in the Center; Cindi Rigsbee, Region 5 TOY, NC TOY 2008-2009, Finalist for National TOY on the Right

Southwest Region 6, James Ford, Social Studies Teacher, Garinger High School:
https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=380237865445110&id=308452419290322

James Ford in the Center; Julian Wilson, Region 6 TOY 2012-2013 on the Right

  

Northwest Region 7, Alex Reynolds, Theater Arts Teacher, Jesse Carson High School:
https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=379326905536206&id=308452419290322

Western Region 8, Melissa Faetz, First Grade Teacher, South Macon Elementary School:
https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=379805842154979&id=308452419290322

Charter School Teacher of the Year, Chris Weaver, Third Grade Teacher, Evergreen Community Charter School:
https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=379735458828684&id=308452419290322

Congratulations once again!  A great journey is before each one of them!

Miles to Go Before We Sleep

“The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,

But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.”

-Robert Frost “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”


Snow on Christmas Day a Few Years Ago

               Robert Frost’s poems are often taught in the English classroom as exemplars of symbolic and thematic meaning.  His poems, including the famous “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,” examine the major quandaries of life, the questions of life and death and the choices that we make.  While the last stanza of this famous poem alludes to the eternal sleep of death, I also find these four lines very apt in describing the past few months of my journey as North Carolina Teacher of the Year and the journey we all have before us to improve public education in our state.

               Over the months of November and December, my home has become my car, and I have spent many hours traversing the miles across North Carolina.  In fact, in the first three weeks of December alone, I put almost three thousand miles on my car as I spoke in different counties and announced the nine new Regional Teachers of the Year!  There have been many moments where I have felt like there are miles and miles to go before I get to rest, and at times the journey has been overwhelming.  I’ve found myself wanting to stop and rest, comforted by the “lovely” sights and sounds of my familiar home in Guilford County, yet I’ve continued traveling, often a little road weary, from place to place because I know that the job I have as an advocate for public education in our state is far too important for me just to stop and relax, complacent with where I am.

Miles to Go...

 

               This idea of continuing the journey and not stopping in the embracing arms of what is comfortable also resonates for all of us in public education.  While there are many ways that we can keep moving forward, there is one area that most recently has received a great deal of press: the rather disappointing number of teachers who have left public education in North Carolina.  The Teacher Turnover Report released by the Department of Public Instruction reveals that teacher turnover in North Carolina is at a five-year high of 14.33% in 2012-2013.  While numerous factors were cited for teachers leaving their current positions, including some teachers moving into other non-classroom education positions, this increase in turnover should be addressed.  One of the largest groups to experience turnover was the group of tenured teachers in North Carolina.  Many of these teachers retired last year, and in the upcoming years we can expect to see more of the baby boomers retiring from their teaching positions.  Knowing that positions will be opening, it becomes clear that we must think carefully about how we can recruit and retain the best and brightest into the teaching profession.  I certainly do not have all the answers, but below are some ways I believe we can recruit and retain great teachers.  Note that some ways are quite simple and can be completed in-house with little additional funding, while other ways require more financial investment and commitment to education. 

Raise the Floor to Raise the Bar

               Much has been written about the low salaries for teachers in North Carolina, especially for those in their first six years of teaching.  I will not address salary increase too much in this post, but it still needs to be addressed.  The average salary in North Carolina falls forty-sixth in the nation and tenth in the Southeast, ahead only of West Virginia and Mississippi.  That is a sad decline for a state that was once at the national average and a leader among its Southeast peers.  If we are going to attract our brightest students in North Carolina, we have to make education become a valued profession.  

Why We Teach--Our Students (Students at Evergreen Charter in Asheville)

One of the most visible ways to make education appear more appealing to top achieving high school students and their parents is to increase the base pay for teachers.  If we raise the base pay and find ways to create a new, more sustainable salary increase over the years of teaching, then we will be able to attract and keep more outstanding scholars in the field of education.  All too often I’ve been told by the parents of my exceptionally gifted International Baccalaureate students that as much as their children want to become teachers, they are discouraging them from entering the profession because they are worried they will not make a sustaining salary.  If we raise the floor of the base pay for incoming teachers and allow opportunities for professional and salary growth as they advance in their careers, then we will raise the bar for the type of students who will want to enter the teaching profession.

The Irreplaceables—Compassion, Gratitude, and Opportunities for Leadership

My ideas for this area of improvement come not only from personal experience, but also from a report titled “The Irreplaceables” that was published by TNTP in the summer of 2012 on ways to retain the top teachers during the critical first few years of their teaching careers.  Fifty percent of teachers leave the profession in the first five years of teaching, and this report examines a myriad of reasons for the exodus of many great teachers, including factors like compensation, lack of opportunities for increased school leadership, poor school culture, and ineffective school leadership.  What I find most interesting in this report is the list of eight “low-cost” intervention strategies that are grouped into four categories: 1. Feedback and Development (regular, positive feedback; guidance in discovering areas to develop; informal, critical feedback about performance), 2. Recognition (recognized publically for success; informed that they are high-performing), 3.  Responsibility and Advancement (shown paths for growth as a teacher; placed in charge of key school activities or initiatives), and 4.  Resources (provided with more critical resources for their classrooms).  Information from the report showed that when an outstanding teacher in the first few years experienced just two or more of these strategies, then they stayed up to six years longer than other “irreplaceable” teachers who did not experience this support from their administrators. 

A Holiday Social Honoring Beginning Teachers and Their Mentors in Lexington

These eight strategies are easy ways to make our new teachers feel valued and like they have chosen a viable career path.  One of my former administrators did an outstanding job with categories one through three for me (I entered teaching during the recession, so extra classroom resources were not really possible at that point).  This administrator gave me both formal and informal feedback on my teaching, which included both praise and areas for improvement.  She recognized my hard work and successes (high AP scores for students and a positive observation of me working with my inclusion students) at a faculty meeting, and told me one-on-one that I was a high-performing teacher in our school.  Finally, she reached out to me to encourage that I hone my leadership skills as a co-chair of the “Possibility Thinkers” at my school, a group that sought innovative solutions to improved school financial expenditures and instructional practices.  Her encouragement during my first few years teaching were major factors that led to me continuing in the teaching profession.  Think about the difference we can make in the careers of our outstanding young teachers if we simply acknowledge their strengths and help them grow as practitioners and leaders in the school.

Take a Breath

               While I am a proponent for effective change in our schools, sometimes we need to take a step back and look at all the changes we have recently implemented and see how they interact with each other.  We need to take a deep breath and think about which changes most directly impact the success that our students will have.  Often these most impactful changes do not involve increased paperwork and stress for the teacher who needs to spend those hours planning engaging lessons, differentiating learning, providing feedback on assignments, and tutoring students.  We need to find a balance for educators so that they are able to spend their time focusing on the real reason why they started teaching—their students.  Far too many new teachers and experienced teachers become disillusioned with the disconnect between their passion for educating and working with students and the additional, often seemingly unnecessary required paperwork and duties.  Like the speaker in Robert Frost’s “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,” although we still have many miles to go, we must also stop from time to time to examine how we need to keep moving forward.

Taking a Breath in Edenton, NC to Enjoy the Sunset

In essence, we need a combination of all of these strategies in order to improve teaching as a profession in North Carolina.  We cannot become so comfortable in the “lovely, dark, and deep” traditions of the past, that we forget that we still have “miles to go before [we] sleep.”  Nor can we keep moving forward so fast that we don’t take the time to discover what is really needed to recruit and retain the best teachers in our state.  It is going to take effort from all stakeholders to improve the teaching profession in North Carolina, and I sincerely hope we can all work together in order to make the journey more sustainable and rewarding for all involved.  Let us travel the miles together so we can focus on “the promises to keep” for success for all of our students.

The Train Tracks and Road Ahead in Dillsboro, NC

May Your Holidays Be Bright!

The below blog post was originally included in the Superintendent's Bi-weekly Newsletter:
 

            With the holiday season at hand, bright lights illumine much of our state.  Whether the twinkling lights on a Christmas tree, the multicolored candles on a menorah or a kinara, the lights on a mosque or in a home for Malwid al-Nabi, or the bright traditions of other religions and cultures, our state and our world become a shimmering festival of colors and illumination from November to January.  The bright shining lights of our holiday season and the many different ways they are displayed are analogous to my experiences during the first half of the year as North Carolina Teacher of the Year.

Beautiful Lights in Edenton, NC

               When I last wrote a message for the Bi-Weekly Newsletter, I was struggling to define my role as North Carolina Teacher of the Year.  I now understand my role is to continue being a teacher among prospective teachers, current educators, community members, business leaders, and policy makers.  As I have worked with and/or traveled to a little over forty counties during the first half of the year, my perspective on what it means to be a teacher in our state has broadened and deepened to include traits as diverse as the people and the holiday lights they display.  I have been awed to see the different roles that teachers in North Carolina embrace, especially in a year when teacher morale is low.

Decorations at the Madison Inn Bed and Breakfast in Whiteville, NC

 I have seen data team meetings where all teachers were invested in examining benchmarks and improving student achievement.  I have seen teachers captivate a room full of students with their ability to tell stories.   I have seen teachers use one-to-one technology to enhance personalized learning for their students.  I have seen teachers lead pep rallies with enthusiasm.   I have seen teachers sing and dance with their students, and I have seen them cry with empathy for their students.  I have seen teachers coach other teachers and their students to success, and I have seen great innovations in classrooms to address ESL students, EC students, students who are economically disadvantaged, AG students, and every student in-between.   I have met future teachers in colleges of education who inspire me to keep growing and keep reflecting, and I have met experienced teachers who stand strong with years of experience as their foundation.   

               I have also witnessed teachers and educators take on an active role in their communities, sharing their voices with the public about what is best for our public schools and our 1.5 million students.  I am proud of the teacher leaders who are using their voices to educate others beyond the walls of their classrooms and who are advocating for public education in our state.   All that I have seen makes one thing clear: North Carolina teachers are flexible, enlightened, compassionate, passionate, and dedicated.  No one teacher is the exact same, and it is only because of our beautiful differences that we are able to reach out to all of our students. 

As the holiday season continues, I want to sincerely thank you for being a shining beacon in your communities and in North Carolina.   I wish everyone a bright holiday season and a bright second half of the school year.  I am honored to represent you and the education profession in North Carolina. 

At the Greensboro Holiday Parade with Ged O'Donnell, Guilford County Principal of the Year

 

November in Review: A Photo Blog!

        As stated in my previous blog post, A Season of Thanks, November has been very busy, and I will not be able to meet my goal of four blog posts this month.  However, this edition of my monthly photo blog will serve as two blogs in one: my "On the Road" travel update and my photo blog! 

       November has been a month of inspiring educators, errant doors on the road, exciting educational programs, engaging community leaders, and exceptional North Carolinians.

Inspiring Educators:

     As I travel the state, I continue to be impressed by the outstanding teaching that I see from the mountains to the sea.  I have been so blessed to be able to meet educators--retired, current, and future--who are passionate about teaching and working with students. 

      One of these groups of inspiring educators includes the 2013-2014 North Carolina Regional Teacher of the Year Team.  Meeting these phenomenal teachers and individuals has been one of the highlights of my year as North Carolina Teacher of the Year.  I am so honored to represent each one of them and their regions.  North Carolina is truly in good hands.  Here we are at the NC Awards:

Julian Wilson, Me, Carrie Morris, Pam Mills, Shannon Godfrey, Jill Francis, Thomas McGeachy
(not pictured: Christopher Petree and Jan Adams)

       In addition to speaking at school districts, I have also given some speeches at teacher organizations like Alpha Delta Kappa Teacher Sorority.  When I traveled to Madison, North Carolina, I spoke with an enthusiastic group at Rio Grande.  One of the educators, Frankie Case, is a true teaching rockstar.  Recently diagnosed with breast cancer, she is undergoing treatment.  She told me that after working in education for over fifty years as a teacher and now as a subsitute, as soon as she "beats cancer," she will be back in the classroom as a subsitute teacher.  Thank you, Frankie Case, and all the other inspirational life-long educators in North Carolina!

With Martha Webb, President of the Madison Chapter of Alpha Delta Kappa

The Madison Chapter of Alpha Delta Kappa (Frankie Case is standing up in the back right)

     As a teacher you often establish strong friendships with other teachers at your school.  These friendships serve an important professional function in establishing collaborative groups to meet the needs of students, but they also serve a personal function as your school community becomes a second family.  I have missed seeing my coworkers, students, and their parents this year, but November was a treat because I was able to spend a little time at Grimsley High School and I went on two trips with some of my coworkers.  I traveled to Savannah, Georgia to run the Rock 'n Roll Half Marathon with one of my coworkers, and I later spent my birthday weekend in Boone with an awesome group of educators from Grimsley High School.  

With a Great English Teacher and Friend, Athena Mobley, in Savannah, Georgia

Celebrating Post Race Success!

A Chilly Morning in Boone, NC

     I also met inspiring educators across the state and the country when I attended a Common Core Conference in Chicago in November.  I loved learning more about the standards and spending time with educators who are passionate about content and teaching critical thinking skills to our students.

Waiting for the "L" to Get Deep Dish Pizza with Educators from NC and Colorado

Errant Doors on the Road and Other Travel Tales:

     I spent so much time on the road during the month of November, both in the state and out of the state, that I could tell many tales about kind, funny people and trips that had their struggles, but I'm going to limit myself to three tales of the road.

     My first tale is one of the reasons why I am so proud to live in a state where the people are so friendly.  While stopping in restaurants while I travel, I have had some truly hilarious conversations with North Carolinians.  The people I have met have gone out of their way to make me feel at home when I am miles away from my real home.  One of my favorite moments occurred outside of Clinton, NC at a Wendy's.  When I ordered a chicken salad without any chicken, the lady kindly gave me extra apples and pecans to make up for the fact that I was "a poor thing that didn't eat no meat."  She also chatted with me for a while and made me smile in a moment when I was feeling lonely.  I am so thankful for little moments like these as I travel.

     My next tale concerns the reason why I currently do not have a state car to drive.  While waiting at a stoplight to turn into a parking garage at Appalachian State University, my car was hit by an errant door that flew open on a construction vehicle as it approached my car in the oncoming traffic.  Luckily the door was only big enough to break my driver mirror and scratch the side of my car, but it was a slightly nerve-wracking experience right before giving a speech to college students!  Here is a picture of my mirror-less car and the scratch on the door:

My State Car

     My last tale of the road occurred in the Chicago Airport.  I had to leave Chicago on the same day that the tornadoes swept through the town.  After numerous delays and getting on a standby flight, I was able to fly out late Sunday night and arrive in Greensboro very early Monday morning.  While at the Chicago airport, I observed that people deal with stress in two ways: they laugh about it or they get mad.  Sometimes when things are out of your control, it is better just to laugh than to get angry.  I laughed away the hours at the airport with Kelly Hines, a great Guilford County elementary educator.  When we finally got in the air, I was able to see this beautiful sight as we said goodbye to Chicago:

Look Closely in the Center and You Can See Downtown Chicago!

Exciting Educational Programs and Engaging Community Leaders:

     There are some exciting partnerships occurring across our state right now between businesses, community organizations, and schools.  Early in the month, I followed up with the Douglas Byrd 3D-GREES girls in Fayetteville, NC.  They had just received their first 3D printer and were so excited to put their developing engineering skills into practice!

I love the joy on their faces!

     I also spoke to three different groups about establishing and maintaining these partnerships.  While in Wilmington at the first NC Foreign Trade Promotion Conference, I spoke about the importance of business partnerships with education.  While at the conference, I also had the opportunity to get a "sneak peek" of a new technology called URcast that will download online content to devices that students can take home even if they do not have Internet access in their homes.  There are some exciting opportunities for flipped classrooms and 1:1 initiatives with this technology!

A Tour of the Wilmington Port with the NC Foreign Trade Conference

     I later spoke with parents and community members at Grimsley High School on the State of Education in North Carolina.  I was so encouraged by the overwhelming support for education and teachers that I saw from the attendees at my speech.

     Finally, I spoke at the Guilford Education Alliance Moving Forward Summit.  The Education Alliance consists of business and community leaders who support education initiatives in our public schools.  My speech on Moving Forward with our educational practices and business partnerships was well-received and left me optimistic about the ways that we can all work together to make public education a priority in North Carolina.

Speaking at the Summit

Exceptional North Carolinians:

     One of the most exciting events in November was being invited to be recognized along with the Regional Teachers of the Year at the North Carolina Awards.  We were so honored to be recognized at the same event where North Carolina leaders in AIDS research, the arts movement, literature, linguistics, politics, and the NCAE were given the prestigious NC Award.  It was a great evening and a reminder of the impact a strong education had on each of the award recipients.

Governor McCrory on the Stage at the NC Awards

Miss North Carolina (whose platform is literacy)

With the Inspirational John Lucas, an Education Pioneer in NC

A Season of Thanks

               I am sorry for the delay in updating my blog, but November has been the busiest month in my North Carolina Teacher of the Year journey yet.  I have been on the road almost nonstop, averaging only one or two nights at my home per week, including the weekends.  I logged a little under 2000 miles on my state car this month, and I traveled to two different states.  I spoke to high school students, college students, college professors, business owners, community leaders, current teachers, retired teachers, politicians, and parents.  My state car was involved in a minor accident, and I went through the process of getting approval to get it repaired (it is still in the shop as I write this blog post).  To top it all off, I have been battling the common colds going around and have been sick for three out of four weeks during November!       

In spite of what has been incredibly hectic and stressful month, I have also had time while I traveled to reflect a great deal on what I am thankful for and what educators across this state have to be thankful for as it relates to being an educator.  I have seen, listened, and shared in many of the frustrations of the teachers in North Carolina over the past several months, but sometimes we need to take some time to stop and think about what makes education a truly rewarding career path.  Below are my thirty-one reasons to be thankful for being an educator, one reason for each day of November and one extra reason to remember all year.

1.       We work with students and help them find their own paths for their futures.

2.       We teach the content that we love.

3.       We work in a profession where we can always keep learning and keep improving.

4.       We see in others what they can be when they often do not see it.

5.       We are motivators.

6.       We are inspirational leaders.

7.       We give the gift of knowledge.

8.       We help others learn that knowledge is not enough; it is how you apply that knowledge that really matters.

9.       We are tour guides that show our students the world.

10.   We are role models.

11.   We are caregivers.

12.   We get to laugh—a lot—with our students, and that keeps us young.

13.   We get to share in the wonder of a snow day or a two-hour delay, and that also keeps us young.

14.   We work with parents to see their beloved children reach their potential.

15.   We see “light bulb” moments for our students when they “get” something for the first time.

16.   We know that we are the light switches that ignited that moment for our students.

17.   We have an impressive collection of pens, pencils, markers, crayons, paper, etc. that rivals any Office Depot!

18.   We work in a profession where we get to create every day.

19.   We embrace diversity and work with a microcosm of a much larger world.

20.   We collaborate with like-minded colleagues who also want to see students succeed.

21.   We are invaluable members of the community and the economy since we help develop the future leaders of our towns, cities, states, nation, and the world.

22.   We can see the world in terms of possibilities—possibilities for our students, for us, and for the future.

23.   Our workspaces are not limited to the four walls that surround us in our classrooms.  The whole world can become our classroom if we let it.

24.   We feel infinitely connected with the world as our students graduate and move to other states and countries.  Our impact is limitless.

25.   We have strong arm and back muscles from carrying materials home for planning and grading!

26.   We work in a profession that many of us would say is a calling instead of just a job.

27.   We know the different smiles that students have.  We also know that the best smile is the slowly spreading smile of a student who is developing confidence for one of the first times in his or her life.

28.   Sometimes we get the most sincere, touching notes of thanks from our students and/or their parents, and we know that the hard hours we work are worth it.

29.   Even though our eyeglasses prescriptions may get a little stronger every year, we still have eyes in the back of our heads!

30.   We have learned not to take ourselves too seriously, and we can laugh at and learn from our mistakes.

31.   Finally, WE MAKE A DIFFERENCE.  WE MAKE A DIFFERENCE.  WE MAKE A DIFFERENCE.

As we continue into the holiday season and our classes get busy with assessments, benchmarks, and final pushes to meet our unit planning before the first semester ends, take some time to think about why you are thankful that you are an educator.  Sure, there are many reasons I could list of why teaching is a difficult job or of why teacher morale is at an all-time low, but we hear about those reasons every day.  It is easy to complain and talk about what you are unhappy with, but without conversation about how to change those things, it only makes you more frustrated in the end. 

Take some time during this season of thanks to do what the name implies—be thankful.  And as the holiday season comes to a close, I encourage you to make all of the 2013-2014 school year be a season of thanks.  When we start to think about why we teach, then our reasons to make teaching become a more valued profession, both communally and financially, become a little stronger and a little more united.

 

Politics, Businesses, and Education, Oh My!

        When I was an active "drama geek" in high school, I had the opportunity to play the role of Dorothy in the Rockingham County Theater Guild production of The Wizard of Oz. This role was a dream come true for me since I grew up reading and rereading L. Frank Baum's books and watching and re-watching the classic movie. As Dorothy in those six performances, I was whisked nightly through the worlds she experiences in the story: her routine life, safely surrounded by loved ones in Kansas; the fear of the unknown as she is taken out of her comfort zone; and the wonder and anxiety she inevitably feels when she enters the Land of Oz and declares, "Toto, I have a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore!"

My ninth-grade self in The Wizard of Oz

       Dorothy's famous words and experiences echo the year I have had so far as North Carolina Teacher of the Year. I've left my comfort zone of Grimsley High School and entered the excitement and unknown of very different worlds--the worlds of politics and businesses--as an advocate with the best interests of North Carolina public education in mind. I believe we are at a critical moment right now, a moment that will decide if the future of education in North Carolina will return to being a national and global leader or if we will continue to fall behind. As I navigate the yellow brick road of advocacy, I cannot help but notice that in comparison to years past, we definitely are not in "Kansas" anymore.

Oh my!

      The first world I have entered, the political world, much like the glittering Emerald City, offers many opportunities for education if the leaders and citizens can remove the curtain that divides them and engage in valuable, two-way conversations about the needs of public education. I have been honored to serve on a couple of committees, including the Governor's Teacher Advisory Council, that are starting critical conversations between politicians and educators. I am optimistic about the potential these conversations have for impacting positive change, and I hope to see continued collaboration between political leaders and educators to meet the needs of our students and schools.

That's the back of my head on the left at the first Governor's Teacher Advisory Council, photo from WNNC

       Many other teachers have joined in this journey with me this year, and they are advocating at a grassroots level with their communities and local politicians. I was so pleased to see educators switch from talks about walking out of their classrooms on November 4 to encouraging community members to walk into schools and show their support of public education instead. I returned to my home, Grimsley High School, that day and greeted parents and community leaders as they brought notes, signs, and tokens of thanks for teachers in our school. Several high school students even got involved by writing thank you notes for their teachers.

A student writing a "thank you" note to a teacher at Grimsley High School on November 4, photo from GCS Schools

       When asked by a reporter if I thought the walk-in lacked the "punch" that the walk out would have had, I disagreed with him. I think that by staying in our schools, doing what we love—teaching—with those we care about the most—our students, we sent the exact message teachers want to communicate to the public and political leaders. We communicated that we love our students and want to place them at the forefront of our conversations. While there are valid concerns about areas like salary that directly impact teachers, these concerns are expressed so vocally because most teachers do not want to leave the profession they view as a calling, and they desperately want to see the profession become sustaining enough that they can teach the next generation while still providing for their families.

      The other world I have entered, the world of business, also resembles many of the exciting opportunities that Dorothy found in the Emerald City. I most recently spoke at the inaugural North Carolina Foreign Trade Promotion Conference about the importance of progress in conjunction with business partnerships. Businesses initially supported public schools to train up more productive, effective workers, and I believe we can partner with businesses in the same way today. If we can exchange resources and ideas in an import/export model, then we can help make sure our students are fully prepared not only for a global tomorrow, but also for a global today.

Touring the Wilmington Port with the North Carolina Foreign Trade Promotion Conference

      In order to make these worlds work together, it will take the combined brains, heart, and courage that led Oz to greatness in the beloved L. Frank Baum story. Education is the foundation for all successful societies, and we need to continue the dialogue across the curtain in order to see our education and future prospects grow. We need the brains, heart, and courage of all stakeholders--politicians, business leaders, community members, parents, educators, and students--to ensure that North Carolina remains the home we will all want to return to and the one about which we can unequivocally say, "There is no place like home."

Brains, Heart, and Courage must come together for educational success in NC

October in Review: A Photo Blog!

October is a month of fall foliage, first quarter grades, Friday night lights, and Fright Night Fun!  I've been busy traveling the state, meeting with politicians and business leaders, visiting university education programs, and observing outstanding schools that are meeting the needs of their students.  Below are some highlights:

"Fall Foliage" and the Beautiful Sights of North Carolina:

A Short Stop in Edenton with My Mom (She Traveled
with Me as I visited Three Universities in Three Days)

A Visit to the Battleship while in Wilmington

The Beautiful Education Building at UNC-Wilmington

   

    A Snapshot of the Charming Small Town of Forest City while Stopped in Traffic

 "First Quarter Grades"and Education Programs:

Jo Ann Norris at the EPFP (Education Policy Fellowship Program) Graduation

Academic Incentive Program at Chase High School, Rutherford County 

Character Education at Cherokee Central Schools

AdvancED Accreditation
Conference

A Panel on Education at the Public Schools Forum

With an Outstanding Team at Elizabeth City State University
to Share the Benefits of Study Abroad

Talking with Teacher Cadets at ECU
and UNCW

"Friday Night Lights" and "Fright Night Fun":

The Beautiful Turf Football Field
at Cherokee Central High School

"Dem Bones" Display at Cherokee Central Schools
(First Graders Illustrated Their Skeletal Systems with Q-Tips)

New Friends, New Faces, and Great Educators:

Jill Francis, Region 8 Teacher of the Year, Chase High School

Yona Wade and Deb Forrest at Cherokee Central Schools