Four Yelm High School students will travel to Washington D.C. to compete in the 2024 Educators Rising National Conference from Friday, June 28, to July 1.
This marks the first time that YHS will send prospective educators to the conference to compete at the national level.
Bailie Fowler, Taliah Boyd, Kiana Neir and Glennah Wofford will represent Yelm in Washington D.C. and will participate in a variety of competitions, including in children’s literacy, job interview and a speech contest.
YHS has an Educators Rising class and a club, the latter of which is referred to as a Career & Technical Student Organization (CTSO). Students, who earned the opportunity to participate through an application process, will not only compete for national prizes and recognition but will have the opportunity to learn from other prospective educators and tour the nation’s capital.
Fowler is competing in the children’s literacy category for pre-kindergarten and will present her own book in American Sign Language (ASL). Boyd, competing in the job interview category, will present a cover letter and resumé before doing a mock job interview for a paraprofessional position in front of a panel.
“I think that it is crazy how we get to go down there and listen to the speakers speak about what their passions are and their passions for education,” Boyd said. “I think we can learn some really good insight on what it means to be a teacher and how we can improve our teaching skills by doing workshops and listening to other students’ opinions and ways of how they want to run their classrooms.”
Educators Rising, taught by Hillary Hull, offers hands-on experience in the classroom to students in the district. Members learn from Hull in the first semester before spending three days per week in the second semester in a classroom setting with a teacher. Without a program like this, Hull said, they would likely have to wait until their junior or senior year of college to get real-life experience in a classroom.
“There’s no better place to learn if you like something or if you don’t like something than in high school before you’re having to pay for it,” Hull said. “I tell students all the time that it’s OK to take this class and in the end say that you don’t want to teach and that it’s not for you. I think that’s just as great of a learning opportunity as it is to fall in love with teaching while you’re doing the classes.”
Fowler first joined Educators Rising because she wanted a fun class to take, but a couple months in, she realized that teaching was what she wanted to do.
“We got to learn about how the brain works and how effective teaching can be,” she said. “Having a practicum and getting to actually have hands-on experience with the kids, it made me really want to be a teacher. I want to go to college and get a degree in education, and I also want to get a degree for ASL and be a third grade teacher.”
Boyd, who volunteers with the Team Unified Special Olympics teams at YHS, is working to become a special education teacher, a lifelong dream of hers.
“I thought this would give me a really good opportunity to set a good foundation on how to be the best teacher I can be,” she said. “When I saw this opportunity, I knew I definitely wanted to be a part of this because I wanted to grow my skills and knowledge and learn from some of the best teachers.”
Hull said she is proud of how her group of students came together this year and adapted to the different experiences they gained.
“At first, they were scared to talk about some of their ideas, but throughout the year, we’re really developing that teaching philosophy through field trips and getting the hands-on experience,” she said. “At the beginning, a lot of students have an idea of what they think teaching is going to be like, and then when they jump into practicum, they start molding their philosophy based on the experiences that they’re having. I love that transformation.”
During their trip to Washington D.C., the students will also take a moonlight tour of the historical monuments and even compete in a lip sync battle at the conference. While the overall trip is a chance for them to explore and have fun, they’re focused on absorbing as much information as possible.
“I hope to just take in different perspectives and learn some different things that I can bring into my practicum next year and into my future of teaching,” Fowler said.
