They put the Excellence in the Excellence in Teaching Awards
Yesterday we noted the extraordinary achievements of the 21 members of this year’s All-Delco Hi-Q team. They represent one member — selected by their teammates — from each Delaware County high school taking part in the nation’s oldest scholastic quiz competition.
They did not get there by accident.
They are the product of their environments. That starts at home.
But it also is shaped, molded — and yes at times prodded — by some very dedicated professionals. They are called teachers. Monday, we followed up our report on these outstanding students by noting the 19 winners of this year’s Excellence in Teaching Awards. That’s one teacher from each of the county’s 15 public high school districts, an educator from the Delaware County Intermediate Unit, and three non-public educators, one each from the elementary, middle and high school levels. Winners receive a $500 cash award, a commemorative plaque and $1,000 award for their school.
The awards were established several years ago by the Franklin Mint Federal Credit Union and Delaware County Intermediate Unit. The winners will be honored, along with the All-Delco Hi-Q team and all the students who took part in Hi-Q this year, at Thursday night’s annual Partners in Education Celebration gala. The Daily Times is proud to be a partner in the event.
The Excellence in Teaching Award winners are nominated by their peers as innovative educators who have demonstratively made a difference through their work.
In other words, people like Cheryl Scartozzi.
Scartozzi teaches language arts at St. James Regional Catholic School. She’s been a teacher for 44 years.
Perhaps more than most, Scartozzi knows that being a teacher is just one of the many hats she wears every day. That’s why she stresses flexibility as the key to being an effective educator.
“You have to do it all,” Scartozzi said. “Sometimes you’re a nurse, sometimes you’re a counselor, sometimes you’re a teacher.”
She also points out flexibility is not something reserved for teachers. Her young charges need to be able to adapt to a rapidly changing education environment.
She urges her students to “unplug” from time to time, even to the extent of diagramming sentences.
“They look at the board and see the design of the sentence — there’s a benefit to it.”
They say that teachers touch the future.
Scartozzi has been doing it for more than four decades. And nothing gives her greater satisfaction than when a student returns to tell her that they were well prepared for what lay ahead of them.
Of course, as an English Language Arts teachers, she got a little help.
From folks like Shakespeare, Poe, Agatha Christie and Harper Lee.
“Knowing that I am shaping young minds for the future,” Scartozzi quickly responded when asked of her greatest satisfaction.
It’s a theme that is repeated again and again in the comments of the other 18 Excellence in Teaching Award winners.
There is one thing they do not dwell on: Money. No one goes into teaching to get rich. That gives them something in common with newspaper people.
Today school boards and state officials find themselves in a constant debate about the cost of education. School boards are having their feet held to the fire by home owners hard-pressed to pay ever escalating property tax bills.
More than one of the teachers we talked to mentioned the “ah ha” moment, that point when a teacher breaks through and a student grasps a difficult concept.
Bernadette Udovich has been teaching for 20 years. She’s a fifth-grade teacher at Garrettford Elementary in Upper Darby.
“I love my when my students ask questions to understand the process,” she said. “Their eyes brighten and a smile is on their face. Right then and there … they get it and their self-confidence builds.”
William Michael Cruice teaches at the county alternative school. He speaks about the “moment when you realize a student smiles and just got what you were teaching them.”
Cassandra Skursha is in Leaning Support at Darby Township School. She loves it when her learning support students “light up when a new strategy clicks and they are able to understand a skill that they have bene working so hard to master.”
You can’t put a dollar figure on that.
But you can put a title on it.
It’s called Excellence in Teaching.
Our congratulations to this year’s winners.