Empowering Educators through Rural Teacher Fellowships
Rural Teacher Fellows reflect and celebrate with BB2C Staff.
In Appalachia, Ohio a unique initiative is invigorating education. The Rural Teacher Fellowship, spearheaded by OHIO University and BB2C: Building Bridges to Careers, targets teachers in rural school districts, aiming to infuse their classrooms with Community and Career Connected Learning (CCCL).
The Fellowships pair educators with seasoned mentors for three years, offering invaluable guidance in implementing innovative community and career based teaching pedagogies. Over the past three years, the initiative has unfolded through the work of five educators and their mentors. This spring, the Fellows met to reflect on their experiences to date and celebrate the work they’ve done.
Tamara Gibson, a year one Fellow with Cambridge City Schools, shared her experience of integrating community engagement into her new career exploration class that engages all 8th grade students in her school. Through a partnership with the Guernsey County Animal Shelter, her students delved into real-world projects like adoption campaigns and fundraising drives, fostering a sense of purpose beyond textbooks. She reflected after her first year that the Fellowship process was better than lesson plans and allowed her to show her students what they could do!
Year one Fellow Taylor Price, with Bellaire Elementary School embraced the challenge of introducing STEM to elementary students, emphasizing student-driven learning and hands-on exploration. Her approach underscored the importance of making room for mistakes and curiosity in the learning process. This year, her students were able to work with 3D printers. She shared that it’s important that the students drive the process; it’s not about the answer an educator wants, it’s about the answers the students seek.
Crystal Barnett-Sheaves from Marietta City School District, in her second year, used pen-pals and posters to personify STEAM careers to kids. Her STEAM Stories project aimed to redefine traditional perceptions of what a scientist is, highlighting local and regional scientists and inspiring students to explore these career pathways. Next year, she is looking to add a video component to her project.
Third year fellows Katie O’Brien with Union Local High School and Danelle Dudzik with Barnesville Middle School continued to push teaching boundaries, from immersive theater experiences to outdoor habitat explorations. Their resilience in overcoming challenges and adapting teaching strategies exemplified the Fellowship's ethos: true success lies not in outcomes, but in the journey itself. Katie shared that future Fellows should not expect the first year to be perfect nor to give up if things don’t work out and they need to pivot. In 2023-2024, 100% of her students said that they would work with their community theater, the Town Gate Theater, again as a school project. Katie’s focus is now turning to how to find funding to continue to offer Community and Career Connected Learning opportunities in her classroom, once she graduates from the Fellowship program.
Danelle had the opportunity to create a project for her agriculture class, which is phasing out of the school. This change helped her see that Community and Career Connected Learning can be added to any class, no matter the subject. Another great takeaway she had from her time as a Fellow is the importance of changing the teacher's mindset from “here’s what you’re going to learn” to “let’s find out what you learn”!
The Rural Teacher Fellowship underscores the transformative power of rural educators when equipped with support and resources to bring Community and Career Connected Learning into their schools. By nurturing a culture of innovative engagement, career exploration, and community connections, these educators are not only helping shape the future career pathways of their students, but are also shaping the future of education, one classroom at a time.