Former public school teacher and music icon Roberta Flack passes away

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Americans were sad to learn that former public school teacher and Grammy-winning singer Roberta Flack passed away yesterday. Photo Credit: IMDB

Music fans all over the county were sad to learn yesterday of the passing of Grammy Award-winning songwriter and singer Roberta Flack. Her best-known songs are “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face,” “Killing Me Softly With His Song,” and “Where Is the Love?” Did you know that this celebrated jazz, folk, and R&B icon was once a public school teacher?

Roberta Cleopatra Flack was born February 10, 1937, in Black Mountain, Buncombe County, North Carolina. She was raised in Arlington, Virginia. Her mother was a church organist, so of course Roberta grew up in a musical household. At the age of nine, Roberta began to study classical piano, and by the time she was fifteen, she’d earned a full scholarship in music from Howard University. Howard is a traditionally Black college located in Washington, DC.

Roberta completed her undergraduate work, and then her student teaching at an all-white school near Chevy Chase, Maryland. She was the first African American student teacher to work at that school. After her college graduation, Roberta accepted a position teaching music and English in Farmville, North Carolina, a gig which paid her only $2,800 per year. During her career as a public school teacher, she also taught in Washington, DC, at Browne Junior High and Rabaut Junior High School. While she was teaching, Roberta took a number of side jobs as a night club singer. It was there that she was discovered and signed to a contract for Atlanta Records. The rest, as they say, is music business history.

Over the course of her music career, the former teacher has been nominated for a Grammy 13 times, winning on four occasions. On May 11, 2017, Roberta received an honorary Doctorate degree in the Arts from Long Island University. In 2009 she was inducted into the North Carolina Music Hall of Fame, and in 2022, she was honored with the Women in American History War by the Daughters of the American Revolution.

In recent years, Roberta continues to contribute to education came when she founded an after-school music program entitled “The Roberta Flack School of Music” to provide music education free of charge to underprivileged students in the Bronx borough of New York City. The program is offered through Hyde Leadership Charter School. You can learn more about this program at this link: Roberta Flack School of Music.

Roberta Flack suffered from a number of serious health issues towards the end of her life. She suffered a stroke in 2018, and she was diagnosed with ALS in 2022. The iconic singer passed away on February 24, 2025, in New York City, the victim of a heart attack. She was 88 years old. The world will surely miss this exceptional teacher and musician.

 

TX educator Nancy Chavira garners 2024-2025 Milken Educator Award

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Middle school Nancy Chavira of Texas has garnered a prestigious 2024-2025 Milken Educator Award. Photo credit: KRWG Public Media

Hearty congratulations go to Nancy Chavira, a middle school teacher from Fabens, Texas. She has garnered a prestigious 2024-2025 Milken Educator Award from the Milken Family Foundation, one of only 34 educators nationwide to win the award this year.

The Milken Educator Awards have been described by Teacher Magazine as the “Oscars of Teaching.” In addition to the $25,000 cash prize and public recognition, the award includes membership in the National Milken Educator Network, a group of more than 3,000 exemplary teachers, principals, and specialists from all over the country whose work strengthens best practices in education. To learn more, click on Milken Educator Awards.

Nancy teaches mathematics and science to fifth graders at Johanna O’Donnell Intermediate School in Fabens, Texas. The students in her classroom learn in a 50/50 model classroom where curriculum is taught in both Spanish and English.

In addition to her classroom responsibilities, Nancy serves as the school’s yearbook advisor and as a member of the Science Fair Committee member. She organizes the students in her class to participate in the annual O’Donnell Christmas Project, a project that helps to build gift bags of essential to distribute to residents in Ciudad Juárez. And, as if all that were not enough, Nancy also contributes to her community by training families on how to promote reading instruction at home.

“Nancy Chavira sets a high bar when it comes to being a role model for young students and fellow colleagues,” delcares Dr. Foley, a fellow Milken Educator. “Her unwavering dedication has made a positive impact on her classroom, school and the community,” she continued.

Nancy earned her Bachelor’s degree in Interdisciplinary Studies with a concentration as a EC-6 Bilingual Generalist from the University of Texas, El Paso, in 2015.

 

Author Terry Lee Marzell offers freebies for classroom use

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Author Terry Lee Marzell offers freebies for classroom use on this website. Photo credit: Terry Lee Marzell

Teachers are always looking for free resources they can use in their classroom. As a former classroom teacher myself, I know this very well! I’d like to offer you some supplementary materials you are free to access. Among them is a Winter Diversity play I wrote for my junior high school drama students. The play is entitled If You’re Going to Dance, You Have to Pay the Fiddler. Humorous banter, a little mystery, and an important life lesson make this play a hit with younger adolescent audiences. This work is in the public domain. My play has been downloaded 865 times, the last time I looked! You are welcome to download it and use it as you see fit. To check out the play and my other free digital stories, simply click on the link above that says Freebies.

 

Legendary girls’ basketball coach and PE teacher Dorothy Gaters garners many honors

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Girls’ basketball coach and physical education teacher Dorothy Gaters is legendary in Chicago, Illinois. Photo credit: Chicago History Museum

As part of our celebration of Black History Month, we pay homage to Dorothy Gaters, a legendary girls’ basketball coach and physical education teacher from Illinois. In fact, it has been said that you can’t talk about the history of high school basketball in Illinois without including legendary Coach Gaters in the discussion.

Dorothy taught and coached at her alma mater, John Marshall Metropolitan High School, in Chicago, Illinois. Her career began there at 1976, and spanned 45 years. She concluded her career with 1,153 wins and ten Illinois High School Association state titles. In addition, she served as an Assistant Coach at the US Olympic Festival in 1986, helping the South win a gold medal. After such a long and distinguished career, she retired in 2021, but she still works as the Athletic Director at Marshall High.

Dorothy fondly remembered her days as a student at Marshall fondly, having graduated from there in 1964. “There were 5,000 students here then; now, there are only 200,” she recalls. “There was no girls’ basketball team then, which was years before Title IX, which bans discrimination based on sex in education programs and activities that receive federal financial assistance,” she continued. “I didn’t have any real role models,” Dorothy said. “I just watched basketball on TV, but we had a very successful boys team, even when I attended.” And that love of basketball grew. After her graduation from high school, Dorothy earned her Bachelor’s degree in Physical Education from DePaul University. “When I graduated from college, they asked me to come back here to teach and, shortly after that, there were intramurals—and that’s when I started to learn about the game,” she explains.

For her work as a coach, Dorothy has garnered many honors. She was selected as Coach of the Year by the Illinois Basketball Coaches Association seven times, and she was inducted into the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame in 2000 and the National High School Hall of Fame in 2018. She was also named a recipient of the National Student-Athlete Day Giant Steps Award in 1998. Furthermore, the gymnasium at Marshall High has been named in her honor.

Dorothy Gaters: A true Chalkboard Champion.