For the past few months, in collaboration with local area restaurants, Lee Auto Malls has been providing lunches to Maine’s County Teachers of the Year and their school’s entire teaching staff. We wished to recognize Maine’s teachers and their extraordinary efforts they put forth to improve the lives of our children. Additionally, we have sponsored a special classroom project. We thought it might be interesting to learn what some of those amazing teachers have come up with.
Jessica Gregory: Piscataquis Community High School – Piscataquis County Teacher of the Year
Coming from a low income/high poverty school district, my students are faced with many challenges and hardships both inside and outside of the classroom. I teach students who come from low economic backgrounds, where nearly every student is classified as socioeconomically disadvantaged. Many lack exposure to diverse voices in their community as well as in the literature they are exposed to. I strive to create a just and culturally responsive atmosphere in my classroom. We cannot ignore disability discrimination, racism, homophobia, and anti-immigrant sentiments in our country, and expanding my classroom library with diverse and inclusive texts will help students understand their role in the conversations and give them the language to explore these issues. Additionally, more fiction selections will allow my students to see a range of life experiences that will allow each of them to be represented in the classroom as well as see perspectives they are unfamiliar with. I hope to build a book selection full of all different types of people and situations!
Jenny France: Somerset Career and Technical Center – Somerset County Teacher of the Year
My early childhood education (ECE) high school students learn about the importance of providing STEM education and family connections in environments for young children. We will create take home science activity bags for preschool and kindergarten children. This will give my ECE students the opportunity to research and create this activity as well as provide a beneficial resource for the classroom teachers and families who we work with.
Kate Meyer: Mt. Desert Island High School – Hancock County Teacher of the Year
The pandemic offered teachers a unique opportunity to completely revision how we teach our classes and motivate our students. One of the shifts that I have been able to make this year is the shift to having my eleventh-grade American Literature students choose all of the books that they read over the course of the semester. This gift will allow me to update my out-of-date classroom library to include more literature that is representative of our world - authors and characters who: have varying abilities, are BIPOC, and are LGBTQ+. I can't wait to get these books into my students' hands!
Bree Candland: Mt. Ararat High School – Sagadahoc County Teacher of the Year
I'm going to purchase books and videos about the religions and governments we study in my 9th grade World Religions and World Governments courses to build my classroom library. (Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, UK, USA, China, Nigeria, and Iran).
Sara Pendleton: Captain Albert Stevens School – Waldo County Teacher of the Year.
My class has been exploring the world of Harry Potter. We have an Owlery post office for writing letters, we created owl posters and informational reports, we have dissected owl pellets to learn about animal adaptations and we are hosting The Chewonki Foundation to come into our outdoor classroom with real, LIVE OWLS! We are crossing curriculums which becomes a powerful educational tool. Science, literacy and writing along with an experience that they have never had before. This may be the first time a student has seen a live owl, up close and personal. Education should be made up of exciting and unforgettable experiences. Thank you for this funding and bringing this opportunity to our classroom.