I started out my career as a substitute teacher in a continuation program for emotionally and behaviorally disturbed high school kids with learning disabilities. And that, believe it or not, is what made me fall in love with teaching and decide to get my credentials! While working there I received both a special education credential (Mild/Moderate) and a general education credential in biology. I would have stayed there for ever, but that option was unfortunately not left open to me, and after two and a half years there, I transferred over to general education at a regular high school, in a struggling district. I have been teaching there for six and a half years, during which time I have earned my Master’s Degree in Education. My test scores improve each year, and have always been significantly higher than my department’s average.
I teach to the standards with the goal of increasing my students' test scores and ability to score well on tests each year. For better or for worse, this is what I must do to keep my school from being taken over by the state. And kids, like it or not, will be judged at many times in their lives on their performance on tests, so we'd better teach them how to score well! I hope for a future where we don't don't have to focus on such mundane things, but live in the present where we do.
I have a Master's Degree? And my staff gave me teacher of the month last April?
BA in Psychology from UC Berkeley, Mild/Moderate Education Specialist Credential and Single Subject Biology from Chapman University, Master of Arts in Education (Curriculum and Instructions) also from Chapman University
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