Poplar Bluff teachers and families gathered Monday night to celebrate standout educators at the annual Teacher of the Year banquet, held at Poplar Bluff High School.
Awardees are nominated by their schools. This year’s honorees were Allen “Trey” Moss, Traci Durham-Allen, Emily Thurman, Kristen Spain, Casey DesPres, Michael Anderle, Corey Reynolds and Sarah Carter.
Moss was this year’s winner for Poplar Bluff Junior High. He teaches junior high and high school band. His favorite part of teaching is seeing his students resonate with music and overcome personal challenges.
“You know, the cool thing about being a band teacher for 7-12 is that you get to see a student grow and progress over many, many years...watching them mature, watching them find that one thing that clicks with them that gets them motivated and inspired to do better,” he explained.
Moss lives in Poplar Bluff with his wife and their adopted and biological children.
Durham-Allen teaches at the Early Childhood Center. She helps students with intensive needs, teaching them to communicate verbally and nonverbally, sometimes with the help of assistive devices. She values the “amazing communication moments” in her classroom and focuses on the positives, she said.
“You have to look for those little victories. Keep your end in mind, but you have to live and survive by those little things that the kids are doing every day...That’s what gets me to work every day for 19 years, because every day someone’s doing something they didn’t do yesterday, and you have to look for those things,” Durham-Allen explained.
She is the mother of three foster children.
Thurman is an adjunct English instructor at Three Rivers College. She believes the greatest thing about her job is being there for students
“Sometimes you’re not only their teacher. You become their motivator. You become their counselor. And even though things start to stress you out during the semester with the multiple emails, questions, students missing class, you still know at the end that you were that person for them and sometimes you were the only person for them. So for me, the greatest reward is being that person for them,” she said.
Thurman lives in Poplar Bluff with husband. They have two adult children.
Spain teaches reading and math for first through third grades and also specializes in behavior intervention. Her advice was, “Always stay self-reflective. Never get to a point where you think that you know the right way to do everything or the only way to do everything, because I’ve learned over the past few years...There’s lots of different ways to think about something and lots of different ways to meet our kids’ different needs.”
She and her husband have two kids.
DesPres teaches third grade at Sacred Heart Catholic School and enjoys seeing the “moment of aha” in her students as they learn new things. She encouraged teachers to focus on being consistent.
“Don’t worry about the small stuff. Just focus on giving the kids a good education (and) being somebody that they can count on,” she said, since some kids face struggles at home. “...And if they have somebody that they can count on, then it tends to go smoother during the school year.”
DesPres lives in Poplar Bluff with her three children.
Anderle teaches social studies at PBHS and tries to follow his father’s advice: “Take what you’re doing seriously, but don’t take yourself too seriously.”
He stated, “My favorite teaching moments are times I get to run into the students I’ve had in the past, whether it’s the grocery store, in public, and everyone sees that they’re contributing to society. They seem happy and well-adjusted. It makes me feel like I did my job fairly well.
Anderle and his wife live in Poplar Bluff.
Reynolds is a teacher and Behavioral Health Support Program coordinator at TRC. He credited his grandmother’s encouragement and faith with shaping his life and guiding him into teaching.
“I don’t believe that the role of being a teacher is a career. It’s a calling. And that calling requires you to submit to a process that will continue to challenge you,” he said. “It will change your life, it will humble you, it will cultivate you into the educator that you’re intended and called to become.”
Reynolds lives in Poplar Bluff.
Carter teaches high school English at Westwood Baptist Academy. She enjoys the creative aspects of teaching and said, “(I’m motivated by) my students, wanting to see them succeed in life.”
She lives in Poplar Bluff with her husband and children.
The individual Poplar Bluff R-I honorees were Alex Bolt of Poplar Bluff Middle School, Olivia Love of the Kindergarten Center, Katelyn Hall of Lake Road Elementary, Joseph Cochran of the Technical Career Center, Kaisha Pigg of Oak Grove Elementary, Antwonette Pettigrew of O’Neal Elementary and Darla Nunn of Mark Twain School.
The Teacher of the Year banquet is organized every year by the Greater Poplar Bluff Area Chamber of Commerce and is held at PBHS. Guests were welcomed by PB R-I Superintendent Aaron Cornman and treated to a catered dinner from Chartwells.
Chamber President Steve Halter said the event was personally meaningful because his mother and daughter have both been involved in education. He thanked teachers for their service and emphasized their importance to the future of the community.
“The Teacher of the Year recognition event is crucial to the Poplar Bluff Chamber of Commerce because it celebrates educators who positively impact the community, fostering a culture of excellence in education that ultimately contributes to the overall growth and prosperity of the area,” he said. “These educators are shaping our future workforce. (Chamber employees) Morgan and Maci did an excellent job again this year and the event was another huge success.”