Chalkboard champion Paul Howard, a middle school social studies teacher from Washington, DC, was selected the 2018 District of Columbia Teacher of the Year. Paul teaches 7th and 8th grade at LaSalle-Backus Education Campus. His career as an educator has spanned six years.
LaSalle-Backus, part of the Washington DC Public School system, describes itself as a diverse community school united to inspire global thinkers, creators, and world leaders by honoring and developing the whole student.
Paul brings a unique, and pragmatic, perspective to his career as an educator. “It is impossible for a teacher to satisfy all the needs of all their students. No one person can pass on enough wisdom, knowledge, and love to children to prevent all of them from suffering,” Paul asserts. “While most people understand this conceptually at a societal level, teachers experience this first hand. At some point you will fail as a teacher, and that failure will impact a child. Your failures will have names and faces attached to them,” he continues. “A teacher is not the sole reason for a student’s success, nor is a teacher the sole reason for their failure; however, young teachers should know that they will experience both and they both shape you as an educator,” he concludes.