UCA professor among statewide award recipients

The Arkansas Council of Teachers of English Language Arts recently named four teachers of the year at the Arkansas Curriculum Conference in Little Rock. 

Those recognized are: for elementary grades, Debbie West from Jonesboro’s Fox Meadow Intermediate Center; for middle level grades, Jamie Highfill from Woodland Junior High School in Fayetteville; for secondary grades, Tara Seale from Bryant High School; and for college level, Dr. Steven Lance from the University of Central Arkansas.

Nominations for these teachers of the year were provided by administrators, colleagues and those who best know their initiatives and achievements. Requirements for nomination include: evidence of outstanding teaching; professionalism and service in English language arts; current employment as a full time teacher with at least five years of service teaching in Arkansas schools; innovations, successes, and honors in teaching; professionalism as evident in research, study, publication, membership and participation in professional organizations; and service to school, community, state, and nation.

Lance, the college level teacher of the year, is a professor in the English department at the University of Central Arkansas. He is the author of several books and a previous finalist for the UCA Teaching Excellence Award.

Chosen teachers of the year have a passion for literacy and have devoted their careers to share this enthusiasm with their students. Elementary teacher of the year, Debbie West, is diligent as a teacher leader in her school. She leads teacher study groups and is a consistent professional development provider in her district. West is also a National Writing Project teacher consultant and the technology liaison for the Arkansas Delta Writing Project site at Arkansas State University. Middle level teacher of the year, Jamie Highfill, participates as an iTunes University instructor, and as a National Writing Project teacher consultant, co-directs the Northwest Arkansas Writing Project summer writing institute for teachers. 

She is also a member of the Fayetteville English Language Arts Task Force. Tara Seale, secondary teacher of the year, is known for her blog, “Enhanced English Teacher” and has been named “One of the Top 100 High School Teachers Who Blog.” She has also been selected as her school’s teacher of the year, and she won the 2010 Arkansas Public School Resource Center Measures of Academic Progress (MAP) Growth Award.