Greystone, Berry educators named 2017-18 Hoover Teachers of the Year
Hoover school officials today named teachers at Greystone Elementary School and Berry Middle School as the district’s 2017-18 Teachers of the Year.
Carol McLaughlin, a second-grade teacher at Greystone, was chosen as Hoover’s Elementary Teacher of the Year, while Lincoln Clark, a science teacher at Berry Middle School, was tapped as Secondary Teacher of the Year.
Superintendent Kathy Murphy, Assistant Superintendent Tera Simmons and other central office staff surprised the teachers with the news in their classrooms this morning in front of their students.
Elementary Teacher of the Year
McLaughlin is in her 27th year as a teacher and her 11th year as a second-grade teacher at Greystone. She began her career as a reading teacher for Winfield City Schools in Marion County for four years and since then has taught first, second or third grade.
All of her career has been in Alabama schools, except one year as a third-grade teacher in Pennsylvania, according to her resume.
McLaughlin began her career using mostly traditional teaching methods but has sought out ways to make her instruction more creative and engaging, according to a biography she wrote after being named her school’s Teacher of the Year this year.
She creates a classroom environment where the students become leaders and are encouraged to be active in their own learning. She also tries to inspire other teachers to re-evaluate their teaching methods and create more innovative learning environments in their classrooms.
She was Winfield City Schools’ Teacher of the Year in 2005 and Greystone’s Teacher of the Year both this year and in 2006. The Greystone Parent Teacher Association also named her its Teacher of the Year in 2008 and 2015. She was certified by the National Board of Professional Teaching Standards in 2008.
McLaughlin in 2015 started a worldwide Twitter educational chat called #2ndchat for teachers to share innovative ideas. Since 2014, she has organized monthly professional development opportunities for second-grade teachers throughout the Hoover school district, and she also has been a presenter at educational conferences and camps elsewhere. She was named a PBS Digital Innovator in 2016 and presented at the PBS Regional Summit that same year.
McLaughlin has bachelor’s degrees in elementary education and early childhood education and a master’s degree in elementary education, all from the University of Alabama.
Secondary Teacher of the Year
Clark is in his 23rd year as a science teacher and his 18th year at Berry, according to his resume. He began his teaching career in 1995 at Meadowbrook Middle School and then Walker Middle School in Orlando.
He experienced some ups and downs as a teacher and considered leaving the teaching profession, he wrote in his biography after being named Berry’s Teacher of the Year. Around 1999, he and his wife moved to Hoover with a goal of entering optometry school at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. But after he didn’t get into optometry school on the first try, his wife, who also is a teacher, encouraged him to give teaching another try, he wrote.
He was hired at Berry Middle School in 2000 and, after one year, began feeling like he was really making a difference in students’ lives, he wrote. He adapted and continued to develop himself as a teacher, earning national board certification and a master’s degree in secondary biology education.
Clark has served as a mentor teacher in the UABTeach program and is a licensed trainer in argument-driven inquiry and facilitator for the Hoover school district’s Engaged Learning Initiative, which incorporates technology into instruction.
Clark also served as the head coach on the Berry girls golf team from 2001 to 2016 and was named the Metro South Conferene Girls Golf Coach of the Year in 2010, 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2016. He also has served as defensive coordinator for the eighth-grade football team at Berry since 2002.
JSU Teacher Hall of Fame nominees
Hoover school officials also today announced the school district’s three nominees for the Jacksonville State University Teacher Hall of Fame..
The elementary nominee this year is Geri Evans, the STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Math) teacher at Bluff Park Elementary. Evans has been teaching for 21 years and is in her second year at Bluff Park.
The middle school nominee is Valerie Morgan, the band teacher at Simmons Middle School. Morgan is in her 31st year of teaching and in her eighth year at Simmons.
The high school nominee is Jillian Thomas, an English teacher at Hoover High School. Thomas is in her seventh year of teaching, all at Hoover High.