The Fund for Teachers is a national organization that assists teachers in exploring their passions outside the art of education. In order to be considered for the grant, teachers must have been teaching full time for at least three years. An individual teacher can request up to $5,000, while a group can request up to $10,000.
In Connecticut, this year there were 77 candidates selected for this grant, one of them includes South Windsor High School’s English teacher Mrs. White. Teachers in this program will be traveling throughout America, and every continent besides Antarctica, to deepen and expand their knowledge of literature.
South Windsor High School community congratulates Mrs. White for being selected for a fellowship. As a literature enthusiast, White plans to travel through France and Germany in order to follow the paths of three famous writers.
“There are several authors’ footsteps I’ll be following: Kip Wilson, for her novel-in-verse, White Rose, about a student-created anti-Nazi resistance movement from 1930s Munich; Mark Twain, for his travelogue, A Tramp Abroad; Anna-Maria McLemore, for her novel, Dark and Deepest Red, a book whose setting–amid plagues and witch hunts–reminds us not to repeat history; and Michael Ende, for his novel The Neverending Story, which helps us see setting can be constructed to give characters the world we wish them to inhabit so that readers can create meaning of their own,” White explained.
On Mrs. White’s exhilarating journey to deepen her understanding of literature, she also hopes to enhance the curriculum by creating a new and fascinating unit called “Using Setting to Set One Free.” This unit’s purpose is to hopefully encourage students to honor their historical roots through their writing.
“I will teach about writing with setting in mind and how a place can define us, redefine us, shape us, and challenge us,” White stated.
White serves as a figure of self-determination as well as personal growth. Not only does her journey further her career, it also stretches the horizons of the current literature curriculum and inspires students to express themselves through writing.
