Author Archives: Terry Lee Marzell

About Terry Lee Marzell

Terry Lee Marzell holds a bachelor's degree in English from Cal State Fullerton and a master's degree in Interdisciplinary Studies from Cal State San Bernardino. She also holds a certificate for Interior Design Level 1 from Mt. San Antonio College. She has been an educator in the Corona Norco Unified School District for more than 30 years.

Virginia’s Clara Byrd Baker: Talented teacher, civic leader, and suffragette

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Clara Byrd Baker

Clara Byrd Baker: Talented teacher, civic leader, and suffragette.

There are many fine examples of talented classroom teachers who have worked tirelessly to improve social conditions in their community. One such teacher is Clara Byrd Baker, an elementary school teacher from Virginia who has earned a reputation as an outstanding civic leader and suffragette.

Clara was born on June 22, 1886, in Williamsburg, Virginia. Her parents were Charles and Malvina Carey Byrd. As a young woman, Clara enrolled in Hampton Institute. She also attended Virginia State College for Negroes, now known as Virginia State College, where she earned her Bachelor’s degree in Education. She was only 16 years old at the time.

After earning her degree, Clara launched her career as an educator in 1902 when she accepted a position as a teacher in a one-room schoolhouse in James City County, Virginia. In 1920, she became a teacher at a public training school for African American students. Later, she joined the faculty at Bruton Heights School in Williamsburg. After a career in the classroom that spanned an amazing 50 years, Clara retired in 1952.

Throughout her life, even during the years she taught school, Clara served as a leader in Williamsburg’s African American community. She worked to expand educational opportunities for students, to improve inter-racial relations, and to secure the vote for women. In fact, after the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was ratified, Clara became the first woman in Williamsburg to vote.

For her efforts, Clara earned numerous accolades. In 2007, she was honored by the Virginia State Library and Archives as an African American Trailblazer. The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation recognized her achievements in 2011. The Virginia State University Alumni Association gave her a Meritorious Service Award and named her their Alumni of the Year. In 1989, a newly-built elementary school in Williamsburg was named in her honor.

Clara Baker Byrd passed away on October 20, 1979, at the age of 93. She is interred in Cedar Grove Cemetery in Williamsburg.

Florida teacher Daniel Dickey: His enthusiasm for the profession is infectious

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Daniel Dickey

Florida teacher Daniel Dickey: His enthusiasm for the profession is infectious.

Every once in a while there comes along an amazing teacher whose enthusiasm for the profession and dedication to his students is just plain infectious. Daniel Dickey, a high school English teacher in Florida, is a teacher like this.

Daniel earned his Bachelor’s degree in Writing and Rhetoric from Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton, Florida. After his graduation from college, Daniel signed up with the Teach for America organization. Through this program, he worked as a teacher of writing and debate at Northwestern High School, an inner city high school in Miami, Florida.

In the past, Northwestern had a reputation as a failing school, where students couldn’t read, write, or do math at grade level. Graduation rates were low. But after years of hard work, including improved instructional strategies and curriculum requirements at the District level, Northwestern is now considered an A-rated school. Part of the success that Daniel was able to achieve in his classroom was due to Teach for America’s Million Word Campaign, an effort designed to encourage his sophomore students to read more. Daniel launched the campaign because he believed that when students are avid readers, they become better writers and speakers. Before long, his program spread throughout the school.

Daniel used his considerable energy to help other teachers, too. During his two years in the classroom, Daniel raised over $105,000 for colleagues in low-income schools. For this work, he garnered praise from Randi Weingarten, who was then president of the American Federation of Teachers.

He was also selected to be an ambassador For the Fuel Your School campaign sponsored by the Chevron Corporation. In this role, Daniel volunteered to help teachers in Title 1 schools apply for and receive educational funding for their classrooms. This initiative led to more than $500,000 being distributed to teachers in high-need schools. For this effort, Daniel was honored by the Miami Marlins when he was invited to throw out the first pitch at their season opening game.

After he completed his obligation to Teach for America, Daniel returned to school, where he earned a Master’s degree in Higher Education from Harvard University.

Daniel Dickey: a true Chalkboard Champion.

Gail Giles of Texas: English teacher and author of young adult fiction

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Gail Giles

Gail Giles of Texas: English teacher and author of young adult fiction

Many gifted teachers earn recognition for their artistic efforts outside of the classroom. One example of this is Gail Giles, a high school English teacher from Texas who has made a name for herself as an award-winning writer of young adult fiction.

Gail was born September 24, 1955, in Galveston on the Gulf Coast of Texas. She was raised in LaMarque, a suburb located just south of Houston. After her graduation from high school in Nacogdoches in eastern Texas, Gail enrolled at nearby Stephen F. Austin State University. There she earned degrees in English, speech, and drama. After her college graduation, Gail taught courses in English and remedial reading at Angleton High School in Angleton, Texas. Her career as an educator spanned 20 years.

A writer since childhood, Gail published her first of nine young adult novels in 2002. Her work won immediate acclaim. Her first novel, Shattering Glass (2002), was named a Best Books for Young Adults selection and a Quick Pick for Reluctant Readers selection by the American Library Association (ALA) the year after it was published. Her second novel, Dead Girls Don’t Write Letters (2003), was named a Top 10 Quick Pick by the ALA.

There is a good reason Gail’s books resonate with young adult readers. “When I taught the remedial readers I learned that one reason they didn’t like to read was that the books didn’t connect with their lives,” she once explained. “And frankly I thought having all the books out there being so—soft—and always offering hope—was doing a disservice to teens,” she continued. “The last thing to develop in a person’s brain is the sense of consequence, but the legal system decides someone’s not old enough to make a good decision about driving, getting married, buying alcohol, or joining the military until 18 or 20, but we can put them in jail forever at 12. So, I wanted to write some stories that shows that sometimes it can’t be fixed. That reality is harsh,” she concluded.

After living for a while in Illinois and Alaska, Gail and her husband, Jim Giles, returned to Texas where they currently reside.

Mathematics teacher Louis Leithold revolutionized the teaching of calculus

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Louis Leithold

Mathematics teacher Louis Leithold revolutionized the teaching of calculus.

Every once in a while an educator comes along who completely revolutionizes the way his or her subject is taught. This is true of mathematics teacher Louis Leithold of California, who completely revolutionized the instruction of calculus in American high schools and universities.

Louis was born on November 16, 1924, in San Francisco, California. As a boy, he was academically gifted. He attended Lowell High School, an elite public school that accepted only the brightest students in the city. He later worked his way through the University of California at Berkeley, where he earned his Bachelor’s, Master’s, and Doctorate degrees in Mathematics.

In 1968, Louis published The Calculus, a volume which soon revolutionized the teaching of calculus. The book was instantly a blockbusting best-seller, and became the launching pad for Louis’s instructional workshops where he taught his innovative methods to other calculus teachers. One of the people Louis greatly influenced was Jaime Escalante, a legendary educator at Garfield High School in East Los Angeles. Escalante’s experience as a calculus teacher of inner-city minority students is portrayed in the highly-acclaimed movie Stand and Deliver (1988).

During his long and distinguished career as an educator, Louis taught at numerous institutions, including California State University, Los Angeles; the University of Southern California; Pepperdine University; Phoenix College in Arizona; and the Open University in Britain.

When Louis was 72 years old and had already retired from teaching at the university level, Louis inaugurated a calculus program at Malibu High School in Malibu, California. He taught there for eight years. Each year, before the AP test, Louis assigned two to three hours of homework every night. He also held marathon training sessions at his home on Saturdays and Sundays. His teaching methods were praised for their liveliness, and his love for his subject was well known. And the success of his efforts could be statistically documented. While the national average score on the AP exam is 3.01 on a 5-point scale, Louis’s students averaged an impressive 4.5.

Sadly, this talented educator passed away on April 29, 2005, from natural causes. He was 80 years old. You can read more about Louis Leithold in his obituary in the Los Angeles Times at this link: Leithold LA Times.

Give an Inspirational Book to Dad on Father’s Day

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Give an inspirational book to Dad on Father’s Day! If he is an educator. a history buff, or an avid reader, I can recommend two great choices: Chalkboard Champions and Chalkboard Heroes.

Chalkboard Champions presents stories of 12 gifted and dedicated teachers who worked with some of America’s most disenfranchised and disadvantaged students.  Among the captivating stories included is that of Charlotte Forten Grimke, an African American born into freedom in the North, who during the Civil War volunteered to teach emancipated slaves in a South Carolina school established just behind the battle lines. There’s the gripping eyewitness account of the Wounded Knee Massacre by teacher Elaine Goodale Eastman, the talented New England child poet who founded a school for Sioux Indians on a south Dakota reservation. There’s the story of Leonard Covello, the Italian immigrant turned school teacher who enlisted in the US Army during World War I to fight alongside his students, and educator Mary Tsukamoto, imprisoned in a World War II Japanese internment camp.

Then there’s Mississippi Freedom Summer teacher Sandra Adickes who, together with her students, defied the Jim Crow laws of the South and integrated the Hattiesburg Public Library. And Clara Comstock, who found homes for thousands of Orphan Train riders. And what collection about remarkable teachers would be complete without a discussion of Anne Sullivan Macy, the teacher of Helen Keller, and the dedication of Jaime Escalante, the East LA educator who proved to a skeptical establishment that inner city Latino youths could successfully meet the demands of a rigorous curriculum.

Chalkboard Heroes shines a spotlight on courageous teachers in American history who were both exemplars of teaching and role models of society. There are the veterans, such as Henry Alvin Cameron, who fought in World War I, and Francis Wayland Parker, a Civil War veteran. There are the social reformers who put themselves at risk to fight for improved conditions and better lives for disenfranchised citizens, such as Dolores Huerta, the champion of migrant farm workers; Robert Parris Moses, the Civil Rights activist; Prudence Crandall, who defied prevailing 19th-century convention to open a school for African American girls; Carrie Chapman Catt, the suffragist; and Zitkala-Sa, who campaigned for the constitutional rights of Native Americans.

Readers also learn about the brave pioneers who took great risks to blaze a trail for others to follow, such as Christa McAuliffe, the first teacher in space; Willa Brown Chappell, the aviatrix who taught Tuskegee airmen to fly; Etta Schureman Jones, who was interned for four years in a POW camp in Japan during World War II; and Olive Mann Isbell, who established the first English school in California while the Mexican American War raged around her. And then there are the savior teachers like Dave Sanders of Columbine High School, who put their own life at risk to protect the students whose safety was entrusted to their care.

Share these stories with your Dad this Father’s Day. He’ll be pleased.