I vividly remember the day I stepped into the third grade classroom at Sycamore Hills Elementary School. My eyes were drawn to the colorful bulletin boards that proudly displayed student work, my attentive ears heard the giggles of students, and my hands were soon snatched by those of a little girl. That was the moment I knew I would be a teacher.

After graduating from University of Missouri with a degree in Elementary Education and French, I was accepted into the Teaching Fellowship Program, a nationally known program for first-year teachers that includes graduate course work and mentoring by a veteran teacher. This program allowed me to earn my masters degree in one year while teaching fifth grade. It was truly a rewarding experience.

After my first year of teaching, I moved back to my hometown of Independence, Missouri. I had the opportunity to teach at a brand new building, Pioneer Ridge Middle School. My building serves a diverse population with a 60% free and reduced lunch rate. My journey that year brought with it the realization that the math curriculum and textbooks were outdated and our students were significantly behind. Coming from an innovative district that was always well-aligned to Mizzou’s latest research findings, I made it my goal to find something better. I piloted a variety of math textbooks and lead a textbook committee to adopt a new middle school math curriculum. Once we adopted The Connected Mathematics Project as our official curriculum for the four middle schools, I, along with our Math Design Team, spent the next few years refining and aligning the curriculum with the Grade-Level Expectations in Missouri. These expectations serve as the state-wide instructional objectives for school districts. We were proud to be one of the first districts to completely align our curriculum with the state. We are also proud of the 40% increase in our state assessment scores. Our scores continue to climb each year as the curriculum improves and our teachers become more proficient with a balanced approach to teaching math.

For the last ten years, I have continued to teach mathematics to sixth and seventh graders. I am excited to loop up with my current students to 8th grade math and Algebra. I have focused much of my attention on the improvement of mathematics education in my building, district, and the Kansas City metropolitan area. I have served on the Math Design Team for our school district and am currently the Math Department Chair. One initiative that I am particularly proud of is my program entitled “Parent’s Night Out.” This evening activity gave my students’ parents a chance to experience a hands-on math lesson along with a free meal. We had incredible turnouts as so many of our parents want to know more about the current math curriculum and how to help their child. I was honored to be the 2007-2008 Independence Teacher of the Year and a 2008-2009 Teaching Ambassador Fellow. It was an incredible opportunity to travel and represent my school district. It also allowed me to collaborate with fantastic educators and people throughout our community and country that truly care about our students and their education!

I am passionate about my students and my job, but even more so about my faith and family. I have been married to my husband, John, for eight years and we are the proud parents of Sophie and Isaac. We love spending time outside and cheering for John’s high school basketball team.