Any chance I get, I am SO excited to be a cheerleader for our school. I LOVE UT Tyler (see recent interview by UT Tyler here) so much. I have recieved my BFA, MA, and now my MFA from this school. I get to work at a place I LOVE. School Spirit is so important to me! Our school, our model, our opportunities are unlike ANY other school, and I am proud to be a part of it!

I have TEKs that I am certain to hit, but I get the opportunity to approach theses TEKS creatively and have fun learning one idea, many different wants, allowing for deeper understanding and growth.

I love art with my WHOLE heart. I think my scholars can see this daily. I know not all my scholars are going to love art, but I hope my relationship with them, allows them to appreciate it enough because they know I care so much. I have had scholars come in, rolling their eyes at me the first week at my enthusiasm for art, but I work VERY hard at building relationships with my students, and once that relationship is there, the ye rolling may still continue but its accompanied with a laugh and an open minded attempt at the assignment, that usually leads to finding something they really enjoy doing.

I walk the walk. I not only teach art, I am a working artist. This is so important I believe. Just like in PE, I am not going to bark at my scholars to run a mile, without having run said mile. Same goes for art, I will never ask my students to do something I have not myself done. I cannot hollowly preach success in art as a career and not find success myself. I think my scholars are able to see that I am genuine in my love of art and teaching.

I do this by:

• participating in arts and crafts shows

• showing work in art walks

• working with nearby colleges and universities and participating in art shows/clubs/exhibitions

I have helped plan setlist, choreography, organized communication, and helped scholars and teachers understand their role and place in the show. I work often behind the scenes, I am not always up in front of everyone.

With art, I get the AMAZING opportunity to introduce many different cultures and celebrate them! The scholars seem to love learning about new places, ideals, and types of art. Most elementary art teachers do not incorporate art history because they worry it is too much for the little ones, I find that basing projects in historic art processes/mediums/subject matter, they are able to more deeply connect and understand the art we are making. 

2022-2023: The next Field Day preparations are underway! I will be updating here as things take place.

I had the opportunity to design, organize, and facilitate the 2018-2019 & 2020-2021, Field Day. I designed majority of the games, organized the rotation of the day, created teams for classes, held meetings for parents and teachers involved in field day, and set up the morning of. I work behind the scenes and I am not up in front speaking, but ido feel that my planning and designing makes the days possible. I have had a blast designing field day and look forward to doing it again in the future!

With COVID-19 we were forced to quickly adapt and provide education in a new way, with that we experimented with (and LOVED) our live Zoom meetings. We talked and laughed. (I cried happy tears). We were all back together!! It was so good for the soul. We drew together and had fun to socializing and being creative together.

2022-2023 - HOUSE SYSTEM IS BACK! We as a campus have come back to the house system. I am on the committee and represented green house and have helped McPhail and Doxey with the leadership role for the group. 

In 2019-2020 I volunteered to spearhead the RCA House System implementation at our school. I have presented to the school as a whole, held small group meetings, created buy in, staffed a RCA House System House Lead Team, and have designed a roll out plan. This has not been an easy task and is in no way close to being finished. I am still in the middle of an uphill battle to get this system in place. The COVID-19 shutdown has stumped this process. I was hoping to have everything rolled out by the start of Fall 2020, but I'm afraid it will have to wait. This is a program I believe in with my whole heart and I am willing to fight to make it a reality in our school! To learn more about the RCA House System click here.

In 2019/20120 we we adopted the Jesse Lewis Choose Love Program. I played multiple parts in this program implemented, but one that I am very proud of is my school wide Choose Love Bingo Game. I followed the rubric of what it meant to choose love and organized it on the board and encouraged students to sign their name to the board to action they have done recently. Once the scholar hit a bingo they came to me for a prize. This helped the students think about their actions. It also allowed me to interact with more students than my normal 3rd/4th/5th graders and meet and encourage scholars I don't normally get to cross paths with. Choose Love is an incredible program, and I am proud to be a part of it.

I was asked to design the center pieces for the tables set up for the seniors banquet with their families. 

At the beginning of the 2019-2020 year, I had multiple students (many of whom I had last year in 11th grade PE) ask me if we could still play Ultimate Frisbee (a game the LOVED from the previous year). I took some time to get the schedule figured out so everyone could participate, and created a Frisbee Club! We meet Tuesdays and Fridays to play and the scholars love the competition and camaraderie it provides. We have 2nd graders through 12th grades playing the same game all giving their best, it is truly amazing! This allows me to get to know scholars outside of the grades that I teach.

Whether it be just myself or with my team I have both facilitated and participated in parent teacher conferences. During these meetings I have been able to present to the guardians of the scholars the ability and needs of the scholars being discussed. Along with helping to create solutions to improve scholar success. 

When I joined UTTUA I was told there used to be an art club, but no one had volunteered to run it. I offered my services and help weekly with art club along with Mrs. T. I have created project for members to do and am a resource for others in the club when it comes to using mediums or techniques that are more advanced or new. The club is a great place to get to know some students who are not my in normal classes. I really have enjoyed sitting, drawing, and talking with the scholars who have joined our club.

Chaperoned 4th grade to an incredible performance at UT Tyler. The show was fun to watch and culturally educational.

Before the start of the 2019/2020 school year I created a system to help scholars in need. I saw a problem the previous year that really bothered me, scholars came to school without their lunches sometimes. Maybe a parent forgot to pack it, or the scholar lost it, either way they would come into the lunch room without anything to eat and I would scrounge for food for them. This year I created the Act of Kindness Table, its simple but effective. If there are any scholars with unopened and unwanted food I ask them to donate the items to our Act of Kindness Table instead of throwing it out. We then take the food and save it for students who may need it. The scholars love to donate food, the get to take ownership of helping their fellow classmates and getting to demonstrate how to CHOOSE LOVE! It has been a great asset to our school and scholars have greatly benefited from the new system put in place.

I am very happy and excited to say that I helped bring functional fitness to the University Academy. I created and have successfully ran the U-Fit (University Crossfit) club since September 2018. We have raised money through membership, and with the money we have been able to purchase more equipment for the club. Along with donate and sponsor the planned Talent Show and some PE games. The club continues to grow in members and grow in our fitness abilities. My scholars have developed self confidence, self worth, ownership of their own fitness, strength, agility, aerobic capacity, self discipline, and most importantly a growth mindset.

In 2020-2021 and 2021-2022 I facilitated the art entries for the Academic Rodeo. We have had scholars receive special recognition such as "Best Use of Color" and "Best in Black and White" and more categories.

In 2020-2021 we decorated face masks for local first responders and front line workers. We drew fun pictures and wrote thank you letters to thank the nurses, doctors, and staff for sacrificing their safety every day.

In combination with Coach Hazelbaker we help teach the whole child and show by example how we make others in our community feel loved and appreciated. It is something Coach Hazelbaker and I feel very strongly about this and we love passing our love for celebrating others on to our scholars. 

Here you will find celebrations of fellow staff members and teachers. We have our: Easter Celebration, Valentine's Celebration, our Police Officer Celebration, Birthday Celebrations.

Along with my team, I helped create a game and run the station for the scholars in attendance of the carnival.

I was honored to participate in the very first UTTUA graduation. It was moving to stand beside our first graduating class along with my fellow teachers.  

At the 2019 Trunk or Treat I facilitated a zombie flash mob that was organized and planned with Coach Hazlebaker. This was an awesome community event where students (k-5) and teachers all joined together to surprise older students and parents with a flash mob!