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Author Archives: Terry Lee Marzell
Houston STEM teacher Arquala Davis named HAABSE’s 2026 Secondary Teacher of the Year
STEM teacher Arquala Davis of Houston, Texas, has been named the 2026 Secondary Teacher of the Year by HAABSE. Photo credit: Arquala Davis
Many deserving teachers earn recognition for their outstanding work with young people. One of them is Arquala Davis, a STEM teacher from Houston, Texas. She has been named the 2026 Secondary Teacher of the Year by the Houston Area Alliance of Black School Educators (HAABSE).
Arquala teaches STEM courses at Dwight D. Eisenhower High School, a public school fondly referred to as “Big Ike” in the Aldine Independent School District in Houston, Texas. There she instructs courses in Chemistry, Earth and Space, and Biology sciences. She has worked at the school for four years.
In her classroom, Arquala emphasizes creating hands-on, student-driven curriculum that encourages exploration and generates discussion. “I spark curiosity by allowing students to lead their own learning and connect science to their everyday experiences,” she says. “Through labs, activities, and meaningful discussions about scientific phenomena, students begin to see how science is already part of their lives,” she continues. “Students do science every day without even realizing it. The exciting part is helping them understand what they’ve already discovered,” she concludes.
Her award from HAABSE is not the only recognition Arquala has earned. She was honored as the Rookie Teacher of the Year at Big Ike in 2022, and she garnered the Dean’s Dozen Award that same year. In addition, she was named the Austin Outstanding Student from the University of Texas in 2022.
Arquala earned her Bachelor’s degree in Health and Society from the University of Texas at Austin in 2022. She earned her Master’s degree in Public Health with an emphasis in Epidemiology and Data Science from UTHealth Houston in 2026.
The mission of the HAABSE is to uplift educators, enhance opportunities for all students, and celebrate outstanding service. The organization honors teachers across the Greater Houston area for their exceptional commitment to students, schools, and communities.
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Louisiana elementary teacher Regena Beard named her state’s 2026 Teacher of the Year
Elementary STEM teacher Regena Beard has been named Louisiana State’s 2026 Teacher of the Year. Photo credit: CCSSO
Every year, many exceptional educators are singled out for honors in recognition for their dedicated work in our nation’s public schools. One of these is Regena Beard, an elementary school teacher from Louisiana. She has been named her state’s 2026 Teacher of the Year.
Regena teaches courses in science, STEM, and robotics to fifth and sixth graders at Copper Mill Elementary School in the town of Zachary. To further support her students’ exploration of STEM studies, she founded both a Robotics Club and a Coding Club on her campus. In addition, she serves on the Teacher Advisory Council in her district.
As part of her curriculum in her fifth-grade class, Regena’s students explore how matter moves through the ecosystem. They study the cycle of moving from plant producers to animal consumers to decomposers and back into the soil that enriches plants. As part of their study, Regina’s students create animations through block coding on lab computers. “Students are very excited to engage in the content in this way,” she declares. “We certainly don’t do integration with every assignment because you have to teach them how to code first, but we pick and choose what assignments lend themselves to integration,” she explains.
Regena earned her Bachelor’s degree in Elementary Education from Southeastern Louisiana University in 2004. She earned her Master’s degree in Curriculum and Instruction with a Concentration in STEM from Louisiana State University, Shreveport, in 2023.
In addition to her State Teacher of the Year honors, Regena garnered a Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching (PAEMST) in 2022, and that same year she was named Outstanding Science Teacher of the Year by the Louisiana Science Teachers Association. Her career as an educator spans 21 years.
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Iowa educator Mildred Wood: A trailblazer in the field of Special Ed
Iowa educator Mildred Wood was a trailblazer in the field of Special Education. Photo credit: Iowa State University
There are many trailblazing educators who have worked diligently for the rights of others in our nation’s public schools. One of these is Mildred H. Wood, an Iowa teacher who campaigned tirelessly for the rights of students with special needs.
Mildred was born on April 19, 1920, in Alta, Iowa. After her graduation from Humboldt High School in 1937, she enrolled at the University of Northern Iowa, where she earned her Bachelor’s degree in 1956, her Master’s degree in 1962, and a post-graduate degree as an Education Specialist in 1963. She earned her PhD from the University of Indiana in 1970. She completed additional courses in child psychology and learning processes from Syracuse University and the University of Oregon.
Mildred inaugurated her career as an educator in the Rowley Consolidated School System in Iowa in 1939. She taught first and second graders that year, a year she considered a personal failure because she felt unable to help one of her students who had both vision and hearing impairments.
As a result of these personal experiences in the classroom and her subsequent pedagogical studies, Mildred went on to become a pioneer in the field of special education in Iowa. In the 1960’s, she became an expert in the recognition and instruction of learning disabilities, emphasizing early identification and tailoring interventions. She developed and taught courses on learning disabilities and integrated principles of child psychology into teacher training programs. She emphasized diagnostic testing and individualized learning strategies for those who had been previously mislabeled or overlooked.
In addition to her work in the classroom, Mildred was also an author and a newspaper column writer. She published a column entitled “Parents and Learning Disabilities” for the Waterloo Courier, and developed policy when she was appointed to the Governor’s Task Force on Education.
For her work on behalf of special needs students, Mildred garnered multiple honors and awards. She was inducted into the Iowa Women’s Hall of Fame in 2011, and later that year garnered a 2012 UNI Outstanding Alumnus Award. She also earned the President’s Award from the Iowa Association for Children and Youth with Learning Disabilities, and received the highest honor from Iowa’s Commission of Persons with Disabilities.
Mildred Wood passed away on July 6, 2014. She was 94 years old. She is interred at Greenwood Cemetery in Cedar Falls, Iowa.
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Retired Ohio English teacher Sharon Mills Draper is an award-winning author
Retired high school English teacher Sharon Mills Draper has won a plethora of awards as an author of books for children and adolescents. Photo credit: Creative Commons
I always enjoy sharing stories about exceptional educators who have earned recognition as an author. One of these is Sharon Mills Draper, a former high school English teacher who has won a plethora of awards as an author of books for children and adolescents.
Sharon was born in Cleveland, Ohio, on Aug. 21, 1948, the oldest of the three children of Victor and Catherine Mills. Her father was a hotel maitre d’ and her mother worked in the advertising department of a local newspaper. As a child, Sharon loved to play the piano and to read. By the time she was 11 years old, she had read every children’s book in her local library. The librarian then gave her a special library card that she could use to check out books from the adult section.
When she grew up, Sharon earned her Bachelor’s degree in English from Pepperdine University and her Master’s degree from Miami University of Ohio. Once she completed her education, she inaugurated her teaching career in pubic schools in Cincinnati. As a teacher, Sharon earned fame among her students for a challenging research paper she assigned to her seniors. They dubbed the assignment the “Draper Paper.”
Sharon’s career as an author began in 1990 when she was challenged by one of her ninth grade students to “write something.” She submitted a short story entitled “One Small Torch” to a writing contest sponsored by Ebony Magazine. The magazine published her story and gave her a cash prize of $1,000. She even earned praise from Roots author Alex Haley! In 2000, after a career as an educator that spanned 25 years, Sharon retired to spend more time on her writing.
For her work as an educator and as an author, Sharon has earned many accolades. She was named the National Teacher of the Year in 1997. The same year, the Ohio Department of Education honored her as an Ohio Pioneer in Education, and she garnered a National Educator Award from the Milken Foundation. She also won the Career Woman of Achievement, the Dean’s Award from Howard University School of Education, the Pepperdine University Distinguished Alumnus Award, the Marva Collins Education Excellence Award, and the Governor’s Educational Leadership Award. In addition, Sharon earned the Coretta Scott King Award for books about youngsters and adolescents. But she is best known for her Hazelwood and Jericho series.
To learn more about the work of Sharon Mills Draper, see her bio info at Simon & Schuster.
