Teacher of the Month; Mrs. Clemens

     One of the most famous teachers in our school is Mrs. Clemens, our IB and 9th grade Language arts teacher. We all know that she’s pretty fantastic but how much do we actually know about her exciting life? In this article, i’ll go in depth with her and two students about how great she actually is.

     I sat down with Ariel Miyama, An IB student, in the cafeteria to learn about her experience with Clemens. To start, she’s known her since she was the young age of 5 years old because of soccer. However, Ms. Clemens has only been her teacher for 1 year (this year). Mrs. Clemens has taught her a lot about confidence in that time, as she has to many. Ariel described her as caring and compassionate and considers her a friend.

     On February 14th, I met with Ms. Willis, a student teacher for clemens. She will be taking over for her while she’s on maternity leave for the rest of the year. Willis said Clemens is authentic, a leader, huge on equity, always concerned for other, and dedicated.

     “Dedication to me in a teacher is someone who is 8 months pregnant, leading a 3 hour team meeting for the entire ninth grade staff on equity, who then in the middle of that meeting in our 5 minute break that we have out of three hours, decides to run across campus while 8 months pregnant to check in with her IB kids and answer their questions. And then run back.”

     Ms. Willis has learned a lot from her. From understanding that creativity and organization are closely related to knowing that making mistakes is always ok. She has built her confidence as a teacher and has given her resources at every opportunity. Even during class, you’ll see Mrs. Clemens turn back on the display that shuts off in the middle of Ms. Willis’ teaching. It’s always the little things that leave a big impact.

She told me that Mrs. Clemens has created an “Open community” for students and that “We’ll miss her”.

     Lastly, I interview Mrs. Clemens herself. She’s been a teacher for 10 years and for 8 of those years she's been teaching in Hilhi. Her biggest successes include getting her masters degree in 4 years, college soccer, bringing back Link Crew, growing as a teacher, and overall living life happily. Her most unforgettable memories at Hilhi are almost endless, but she named a few. Her first year here she taught tutorial, a class meant to catch students up, which was a bit aggressive. She said that a student even tried to throw a punch at her. That year, she also got shingles, which was strange for her being in her 20s’. One year she was proposed to by a student and she currently teaches that students younger sibling. Her most valuable memory was speaking at the 2012 graduation.

     I asked her if she felt there were any improvements she could make as a teacher. Personally, I think she does a fantastic job. She says that she could do a better job at grading and staying on top of it, she’d like to incorporate more diversity in her lesson plans, and that she’d like to bring more light to P.O.C. issues in school.

Mrs. Clemens has also traveled to many different places because she didn't get to study internationally while in college. She’s traveled to most of the U.S. west and east coast, western Canada, Mexico, Iceland, and most of Western Europe. She also lived in Amsterdam, and Bavaria, Germany.

Some hobbies of hers outside of school are hiking, camping, cooking, reading, playing soccer, going to the gym, and yoga. Unfortunately, she hasn't been able to do many of these during her pregnancy. She’s looking forward most to knowing the gender of her child and not being pregnant in general.

     My last question for her was on how she plans on using her maternity leave. She had no idea. But she mostly plans on doing lots of reading, visiting her parents because this is there first grandkid, and having a quick and easy recovery. Best of luck to her!