Tag Archives: Elementary Teachers

SD elementary teacher Abby Turbak garners 2022 Milken Educator Award

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South Dakota elementary school teacher Abby Turbak has garnered a prestigious 2022 Milken Educator Award. Photo Credit: Watertown Public Opinion

I always enjoy sharing an inspirational story about a talented educator who has earned accolades for her work in the classroom. Today’s story is about Abby Turbak, an elementary school teacher from Watertown, South Dakota. Abby has garnered a prestigious 2022 Milken Educator Award.

Abby teaches first grade at McKinley Elementary School in the Watertown School District. Her career has spanned 13 years, the last eight of them at McKinley. In addition to her work with her first-graders, this hardworking educator has served on her District’s Progress and Curriculum Committees and her school’s McKinley’s Response to Intervention team. She also leads summer professional development sessions for District teachers on topics such as math grouping strategies, classroom management, technology, parent communication, and time management. When the pandemic closed the schools in 2020, Abby helped colleagues create their Google Classrooms to ensure students received high-quality instruction while learning at home.

Obviously, Abby was born to teach. “I became an educator because I wanted to make a difference,” she declares. “I love kids. I love seeing them learn and grow.” She earned the prestigious award in recognition of her efforts to maintain high expectations for her students, for expertly integrating technology into her curriculum, and for sharing her passion for professional development with her colleagues.

Abby earned her Bachelor’s degree in Elementary Education in 2010 and her Master’s degree in Elementary and Early Childhood Education in 2011, both from the University of South Dakota, Vermillion.

The Milken Educator Awards have been described by Teacher Magazine as the “Oscars of Teaching.” In addition to a $25,000 cash prize and public recognition, the honor includes membership in the National Milken Educator Network, a group of more than 2,700 exemplary teachers, principals, and specialists from all over the country who work towards strengthening best practices in education. To learn more, click on Milken Educator Awards.

NY teacher Lynda Brennan earns prestigious PAEMST honors

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Congratulations go to elementary school math teacher Lynda Brennan of New York. She has earned a prestigious PAEMST. Photo Credit: Mt. Kisco Daily Voice

Congratulations to elementary school math teacher Lynda Brennan of Suffern, New York, an elementary math teacher who has earned a prestigious Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching (PAEMST).

This prestigious honor recognizes the dedication, hard work, and important role that America’s teachers play in supporting learners who will become future STEM professionals, including computer technologists, climate scientists, mathematicians, innovators, space explorers, and engineers. The honor comes with a $10,000 cash prize, a certificate signed by President Joe Biden, and a trip to Washington, DC, to attend an honors ceremony with the President.

Lynda has been a teacher at Richard P. Connor (RPC) Elementary School for 26 years. She inaugurated her elementary teaching career as a kindergarten teacher. She has also taught fifth grade mathematics and science. For the past 12 years, she has served her District as a mathematics specialist, working with area Math Ambassadors.

In addition to her work in the classroom, Lynda works with Association of Mathematics Teachers of New York State (AMTNYS) as a Conference Committee Chair; Ten County Mathematics Educators Association (TCMEA) as an NCTM Representative; NCTM as a volunteer magazine referee; and with the Rockland Teacher Center where she facilitates a grant-funded elementary mathematics regional Professional Learning Community. In addition, she has been a speaker at national, state, and local conferences, including the National Council of Supervisors of Mathematics (NCSM), NCTM, AMTNYS, TCMEA, New Cubed, Building Math Minds and Minds on Math Virtual Summits, and the Penn Wood School in the United Kingdom.

As if all this were not enough, Lynda is the founder of the Math MileMarkers children’s book series, a project she inaugurated seven years ago. She says her philosophy behind this endeavor is that mathematics-infused stories can connect all learners to the subject of mathematics in visually powerful ways. The series includes such titles as  “Miss Penny Says Prove It!” (2014), “On my way to Grandma’s House” (2015), “Charlie in Fraction City” (2016), and “Jayla Number Navigator” (2018).

Lynda earned her Bachelor’s degree in Marketing and Management in 1986 from Siena College in Loudonville, New York, and her Master’s degree in Elementary Education in 1990 from Fordham University in the Bronx, New York.

Daphne Fulson named Virginia’s 2022 Teacher of the Year

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Elementary school teacher Daphne Fulson named Virginia’s 2022 Teacher of the Year. Photo credit: Coastal Virginia Mag

I always enjoy sharing stories about exceptional educators who have earned accolades for their work in the classroom. One of these is Daphne Fulson, an elementary school teacher from Virginia who has been named her state’s 2022 Teacher of the Year.

Daphne teaches bilingual second-grade at Portlock Primary School in Chesapeake, Virginia. In a career that has spanned 12 years, she has spent the last six of them in Chesapeake. Daphne genuinely enjoys her work with young people. “Teaching brings beauty and joy to the world,” she asserts. And she has a wonderful reputation among her colleagues. Leslie Russell, Principal of Portlock Primary School, describes Da[hne as a “caring, inspiring, and compassionate educator who has a natural gift for touching the lives of her students.”

In addition to teaching at Portlock, Daphne has worked as an  instructor of English as a Foreign Language at Via Lingua in Peru.  And every summer, Daphne works as a facilitator of content and pedagogy for Teach For America. In this role, her priority is to facilitate an environment where culturally responsive practices are used to deliver anti-racist, high rigor, instruction that promotes moral values, self-confidence, and self-esteem in students, guiding them to collaborate, communicate, think critically, and act independently as productive, problem-solving citizens of society.

In 2013, Daphne earned her Bachelor’s degree from Old Dominion University (ODU) with a double major in communications and Spanish Education, and a double minor in Social Welfare and English. In 2022, she earned her Master’s degree in Educational Leadership with a concentration in administration and supervision, also from ODU. In addition, Daphne has completed courses at La Universidad Veritas in Costa Rica, where she served as an international global ambassador.

In addition to her recognition as Virginia’s Teacher of the Year, Daphne has earned many other honors. She garnered the Sue Lehmann Teaching and Learning Fellowship for the Rio Grande Valley Texas region in 2015, and the Good to Transformational Teaching Fellowship in McAllen, Texas, in 2017. She was also named the recipient of the Segal AmeriCorps Education Award in 2017.

Teacher Anne Burnes McDonald also served in the Connecticut State House of Reps

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Former sixth grade teacher Anne Byrnes McDonald served in the Connecticut State House of Representatives. Photo Credit: Boston.com News

Many fine classroom teachers are also distinguished politicians. One of these is Anne Byrnes McDonald, an elementary school teacher from Connecticut who also served her community in the State House of Representatives.

Anne was born in 1933 in Syracuse, New York. As a young woman, she attended Le Moyne College, a private Jesuit college located in DeWitt, New York. There she earned her Bachelor’s degree in Economics. Later she earned her Master’s degree in Education from Syracuse University.

Once she earned her degrees, Anne accepted a position teaching sixth grade, first in Syracuse and then in Ardsley, New York. In addition to teaching children in public schools, she instructed adult learners who were learning English as a second language. After she relocated with her family to Stamford, Connecticut, Anne was elected to the Stamford Board of Education, where she served from 1979 to 1986.

Anne inaugurated her career as a politician in 1990, when she was elected on the Democratic ticket to the Connecticut House of Representatives. There she represented District 145 from 1990 to 2003. In addition to representing the Cove, Glenbrook, and East Side of Stamford in the General Assembly, the former educator also served as the House Chairman of the Public Health Committee and the Finance, Revenue, and Bonding Committee.

Throughout her life, Anne volunteered for a number of local and statewide organizations. She served eight years on the City of Stamford Commission on Aging; three years on the Connecticut Advisory Board on Aging; four years on the Stamford Housing Authority; and four years on the Housing Development Fund Board. She also served four years on the Connecticut Association of Boards of Education.

In 2003, Anne was forced to resign from her position in the State House and withdraw from her philanthropic positions because of failing health. Sadly, she succumbed to cancer on Oct. 3, 2007. She was 74 years old.

TX teacher Lori Garrett earns prestigious 2022 PAEMST Award

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Texas elementary school teacher Lori Garrett has earned a prestigious 2022 PAEMST Award. Photo Credit: Moore County Journal

It is always a pleasure for me to share stories about exceptional educators who have earned recognition for their work. One of these is Lori Garrett, an elementary school teacher from Texas who has garnered a prestigious 2022 PAEMST award.

The PAEMST, Presidential Awards for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching, recognize the dedication, hard work, and importance that America’s teachers play in supporting learners who will become future STEM professionals, including computer technologists, climate scientists, mathematicians, innovators, space explorers, and engineers. The PAEMST program, founded in 1983, is administered by the National Science Foundation (NSF) on behalf of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. The honor comes with a $10,000 cash prize.

Lori’s career as an educator spans ten years, all of which she has spent at Cactus Elementary School in the Dumas Independent School District in Cactus, Texas. She taught one year in kindergarten and two years of fourth grade math and science. For seven years, she has been developing and teaching a pilot program that provides science pull-out for pre-kindergarten to fourth grade students, and a pull-out enrichment program for kindergarten to fourth grade students. The enrichment program features agricultural and project-based learning opportunities. She has also been working on expanding the school’s Maker Room STREAMS curriculum to include not only STEM goals, but also reading, art, and social studies objectives.

As if all this were not enough, Lori and her students have incorporated produce grown in their classroom garden into food packages which are delivered through a community outreach program. The recipients are enthusiastic about receiving fresh produce instead of relying entirely on canned and packaged goods, explains Lori. For this work, she has twice earned a White-Reinhardt Mini-Grant from the American Farm Bureau Foundation for Agriculture.

In addition to her PAEMST Award and her White-Reinhardt Mini-Grant, Lori was honored as her District’s Elementary Teacher of the Year in 2021. She also garnered the Ag in the Classroom Teacher Award from the Texas Farm Bureau’s  in 2017.

Lori earned her Bachelor’s degree in Marine Biology and a Third Mate License in the Merchant Marines, both from Texas A&M University at Galveston.