Shortridge HS bilingual educator nominated for Indiana Teacher of the Year
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — An Indianapolis Public Schools teacher, Shortridge High School Spanish-language teacher Sarah TeKolste, has been nominated for the 2022 Indiana Teacher of the Year award.
“I fell in love with Spanish. I fell in love with bilingual education and being able to expose students to the world beyond themselves,” TeKolste said.
TeKolste says her focus is to help students and teachers become more aware about cultural and racial diversity.
“I also took on our speakers’ series, where we bring diverse voices who lead in different fields to talk about how to make the world a better place,” TeKolste said.
Because of her dedication, her students are excelling in the classroom. “In addition to my classwork, my students have done extremely well on their IB (International Baccalaureate) Spanish exams and I’m very proud of them,” TeKolste said.
But, TeKolste says, Indianapolis Public Schools students have some challenges she wants to help address.
“Maybe on a systemic level, we’re not serving all of our families equitably and so it also opens up my eyes to some of the gaps that exist and makes me want to think critically on how we can work on a systems level to make IPS and to make all of our schools in Indiana more accessible,” TeKolste said.
She says she studied Spanish at Indiana University and took classes in Spain.
Overall, TeKolste says, she wants to continue helping students thrive as well as challenge Spanish-speaking students. “They need to be reading literature in Spanish and having academic conversations in Spanish and so for the first time this year we’re offering higher-level Spanish in the International Baccalaureate programs,” TeKolste said.
The 2022 Indiana Teacher of the Year will be announced in October. That person will also represent Indiana at the national level.