Lincoln Tech teacher Toni Dahlen motivates students to be better
Teacher named winner of Barnes & Noble My Favorite Teacher contest
Among the models of the human body and human heart and project posters in her classroom, Lincoln Technical Academy teacher Toni Dahlen works to prepare the next generation of medical professionals with the skills to provide top quality care.
Just two years into teaching medical assisting at the career technical education (CTE) and adult school, Dahlen has won this year’s Barnes & Noble My Favorite Teacher Contest. Barnes & Noble in Stockton received 13 nominations for Dahlen out of the 87 that were received for all teachers.
She is the second Lodi Unified teacher in a row to win the local contest. Last year’s winner was Tokay High science teacher Sandi Starr.
Dahlen was nominated by senior student Damaris Aldana, who wrote the winning essay on how her teacher inspired her to pursue a career in the medical field.
“You have taught me far more than just the curriculum of the classroom; you have taught me to fight for what I aspire to be,” Aldana wrote. “As the strong, hardworking woman you have shown yourself to be, you have not paved a path for me to follow into the future, but instead taught me how to do it on my own.”
Dahlen has been surprised and humbled by the response from her students in leading her to win this award, especially considering that she started her career as a nurse.
“It shows you how I can reach out to those students. I have the power to motivate them to be better and to be more hungry,” she said.
Born and raised in San Francisco, Dahlen was all set to use her full-ride scholarship to go to the California Culinary Academy in San Francisco when her mother pulled her aside.
“My mom, being the business woman she is, said, ‘Toni, there’s no money in baking,’” Dahlen said. “I thought, ‘Come on, people need to eat!’”
Her mom wanted one of her six children to become a nurse and she was going to be it. Dahlen likened it to being an arranged marriage, where over time she ended up loving the field, even if it wasn’t really what she wanted at the time.
Starting on a path through the medical field, Dahlen took a CTE class and became a certified nursing assistant (CNA) working for a couple of convalescent homes to start. She continued her education and became a phlebotomist working for Hunter Laboratories in Fremont. At Mission College in Santa Clara, she earned her associate’s degree in nursing and soon after completed an LCM program to become a nurse.
She spent most of her career as a psych nurse at John Muir Health in Walnut Creek working with patients for which there is no cure for what ails them, only treatment, therapy and care.
“There’s constant learning, constant trying to figure out why the patient is the way they are,” she said.
After 10 years working there, the department was shut down in the early 2000s. A friend convinced her to join her in teaching at a CNA program in Fremont and she loved it.
She earned her bachelor’s degree in medical education and teaching credential from the University of California, Berkeley and has taught classes at several different colleges before coming to Lodi. Dahlen currently serves as a teacher mentor at UC Berkeley, works part-time with the military to do health assessments of new recruits and consults with other schools on teaching medical assisting programs.
In her class, she provides students with basic knowledge of what happens in the medical industry, terminology, anatomy and health, telephone technique and communication with patients.
“I train my students like soldiers. I want you to take care of me how I want to be taken care of — how anyone should be taken care of,” Dahlen said. “You hear stories about elder abuse in care homes, and I want to prevent that. I want to set a standard in the medical industry.”
Before the end of the semester, students go out into the community to work on externships to gain real world experience in medical offices.
Students swap classes with another medical assisting instructor during their second semester and learn more technical skills.
“I think CTE programs are so special,” Dahlen said. “When students go into their senior year in high school, the next line of thinking is, ‘What am I going to do?’” Students come out of the class already with 10 college credits under their belts, and gives them a taste of what college will be like, she said.
What’s most rewarding about teaching for Dahlen is that moment when students really get what she’s teaching.
“If I didn’t have to do this for the money, I’d do this for free,” she said. “That’s how much medicine means to me. That’s how much medical education means to me.”
Dahlen will be honored in a special reception at Barnes and Noble in Stockton on Tuesday, March 28 at 6:30 p.m.
She will move on in the competition for the chance to win the regional competition and a $500 Barnes & Noble gift card and a NOOK by Samsung. Among regional winners a teacher will be selected as the national winner with the chance to win $5,000 for the teacher’s school.