Student Spotlight: Brittany Copeland

BAE English Secondary Education

Brittany Copeland is a student in the 51福利社 Teacher Preparation Program majoring in Secondary English Education. She graduates in Spring 2020.

What projects have you worked on that you would like to highlight?

I am so excited to have the opportunity to continue to work with my students from my placement school. To ensure the safety and well-being of teacher candidates and the K-12 students during the current health crisis, student teaching internships were understandably canceled for spring quarter. Thankfully, I have been fortunate enough to continue to work with my mentor teacher, Maria Sturgeon at Ferris High School, on a volunteer basis.

Mrs. Sturgeon has had a profound impact on my education and my growth both professionally and personally. Through these difficult times, she has allowed me to support, teach, and learn from my high school English students through distance learning. This has been an exciting adjustment, and it is not lost on me that this is an amazing opportunity I have been given. My hope is to support Mrs. Sturgeon and our incredible students as we adjust to a new model of learning.

How have your 51福利社 experiences shaped you?

Being a post-baccalaureate, non-traditional student has been a unique experience. It鈥檚 been a challenge balancing my family and my own pursuits. Thankfully, my husband and children have been supportive and excited about my endeavors. They have cheered me on which has given me even more drive to do well. I鈥檝e really had to learn to prioritize what’s important as I balance caring for my family with my education. I鈥檝e had to cut back on distractions and trivialities. This second experience at the university has really given me the drive to cultivate a life of simplicity and togetherness for my family.

I鈥檝e gained a new appreciation for classic literature that I鈥檇 like to share with my students. When I first joined the Secondary English program, I told my advisor, Sean Agriss, that I believed in helping students learn to love to read. At the time I thought the best way to do that was through Young Adult Literature. Agriss certainly knew something I didn鈥檛 and encouraged me to embrace classic literature as part of my personal canon.

While I still feel YA literature can have a profound impact on students, I believe studying classic literature allows us to connect to people across time and space through common human experiences. The best pieces of literature contain these Easter Eggs, like those surprise connections you might catch in a Pixar film. However, the reference isn鈥檛 to the first movie in the series. Instead, the reference is to you or the world you live in, even though the work was written some 150 years before you were born.

I really believe the stories we read shape and sometimes validate who we are, and I hope to instill a strong desire to make these connections in my students. Agriss and the English Department at 51福利社 have really shaped my approach to education. I am eternally grateful for their wisdom and support.

What important lessons or tips do you have for future students?

Enjoy your life. Enjoy the moments you鈥檙e in. Allow yourself to feel the good and the bad. Continue to grow. Continue to fail and learn from your failures. Call your grandparents. Send thank you cards.

Do you have anything else you would like to share with readers?

In the coming years, I see myself getting a handle on teaching English to secondary students. That said, I鈥檓 not ready to fast forward five years. Let time crawl so that I may breathe in every precious moment of my life with my husband and children.

Every November the National Council of Teachers of English hosts a convention where thousands of educators, experts, authors, administrators, publishers, and more travel to Baltimore, Maryland to attend workshops, listen to keynote speakers, make presentations, etc.

For the past four years, professor Shelly Shaffer has had the honor of taking a few of her students as presenters for the convention’s round table event “The Future is Now: Exploring 21st-Century Teaching Ideas with the Next Generation of English Teachers”

Each table has different roundtable presentations that explore 21st-century teaching ideas and research-driven pedagogical practices. Students put together a 10-12 minute presentation across a broad spectrum of categories and this year Kilee Wilson and Alison LaFrance presented Picture Books Past the Primary Grades聽and Autumn “Zoe” Romero presented聽Going Bare Bones: Double the Language, Double the Fun.

Going to the NCTE conference was a truly amazing experience! …I was completely immersed in literacy for the entire week… I learned new strategies to teach reading and writing that I cannot wait to use in my future classroom.

-Alison LaFrance

Student Stories: A look back at their experience

Alison LaFrance:

I would have to say that going to the NCTE conference was a truly amazing experience! A once in a lifetime experience that I am extremely grateful for. At this conference, I was completely immersed in literacy for the entire week, which was absolutely amazing. At the various sessions I attended, I learned new strategies to teach reading and writing that I cannot wait to use in my future classroom with my future students.

Additionally, having the opportunity to meet so many different authors was truly the icing on the cake. Meeting them to me made their stories so much more real and

personable. For example, after meeting John Green and hearing he had similar struggles and mental issues as me in middle school, it changed how I view him and his novels. These authors that we idolize are normal people just like you and me but have the artistic ability to create beautiful literature.

I even had the opportunity to present on a topic I am passionate about (Picture Books Past the Primary Grades) with my fellow colleague and friend Kilee Wilson. We have even been asked to publish our research and present it to other college classes through Zoom. Being able to present reminded me that although I am still young and new to the education world, I still have valuable ideas that are important.

Overall, I am so thrilled to have gone to Baltimore and attend this conference. Being surrounded by other literacy lovers made the experience as a whole amazing. Being around people that have the same passion as you helps drive that passion. That is what happened to me. Coming home, I have an even larger love for literacy, I just want to read, and I cannot wait to teach my future students in ways I learned that will help grow their love of literacy too.

I am forever grateful for this opportunity, and because of it, I will be a better teacher in the future!

Kilee Wilson:

As a literacy elementary education major, I spend a lot of time reading books, working with kids and collaborating with other pre-service teachers. When I first heard of The National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) conference a year and a half ago, I knew I had to be a part of it during my senior year. After all, what educator doesn’t like to mingle with other educators and make new friends all while learning?!

From the beginning my partner, Alison, and I made a plan to present; and we worked hard and made this small adventure happen! It was a lot of late, late nights, extra research and endless amounts of time; nevertheless, we made it! On November 20th we landed in Baltimore, Maryland and were more than ready to take on NCTE! It was six long days of tired feet and happy smiles, and I wouldn’t have had it any other way! I personally had so many takeaways there is not time nor space to write them all down! The biggest and most important takeaways of this conference for me were: the allotted time to work with other educators and participate in group discussions, time to listen to authors speak and the platform to build a network for my future career. In addition, I also received hundreds of new books, of all levels, for my future classroom…at zero cost!

I went into this conference knowing that it would change my outlook on education, but little did I know what a lasting impact it would really leave on me personally. I can not say enough great things about the people I met, the experiences I had and the new ideas I walked away with. I can only hope that at one point in all educators’ careers that they will be able to attend NCTE. I am so grateful for the opportunity that Shelly Shaffer presented me over a year ago. I am forever grateful for the support of my department, my school, and my family. Without their financial help and their dedication I would not have had the pleasure to speak at the Future is Now session or even attend NCTE at all. I am very thankful for the opportunity and I look forward to attending next year as a first-year teacher!