Officials with the Kentucky Department of Education have named their new class of ambassadors for the GoTeachKY initiative.
Among the 21 selected includes Freedom Elementary’s Heather Carden.
She and the other 20 ambassadors now must embrace a mission to ensure all students across the Commonwealth have equitable access to effective and talented educators. As such, they must work to recruit the next generation of teachers in the Commonwealth, helping to remedy the critical teacher shortage that affects every state in the U.S.
These ambassadors have three main goals:
— Communicate with, and inspire, students in high school and college to consider teaching as a career;
— Communicate with potential and current teachers to promote the rewards and opportunities associated with a teaching career;
— Support and promote the central focus areas, programs and organizations of GoTeachKY, such as Educators Rising Kentucky and the Teaching and Learning career pathways.
The ambassadors were selected from a pool of applicants from across the Commonwealth, who answered the call for educators interested in supporting this initiative — and helping promote the teaching profession.
Ambassadors have to hold, or have held, a teaching position in a Kentucky public school, while owning at least four years of experience as a teacher, principal or other certified school staff member.
Furthermore, each ambassador selected has a unique story that brought them into the teaching profession, and their stories will be featured on social media as examples of the different pathways available to future educators.
In February, Frankfort’s House Education Committee met to discuss problems surrounding the state’s teacher shortage — which is very real. Former state Education Commissioner Dr. Jason Glass told the committee that Kentucky’s teacher turnover rate eclipsed 20% in 2021.
It was an all-time high, and the state has remained above the national benchmark of 15%-16% turnover for the last handful of years.
Key problems: lack of pay, lack of support and lack of respect.
The COVID-19 pandemic also put incredible pressure on educators, who felt the shifting burdens of virtual and in-person teaching through real-time.
Other ambassadors include:
Mackenzie Pettus Adams, Rockfield Elementary School (Warren County)
Robyn Ballinger, Chenoweth Elementary School (Jefferson County)
Steven Daniel Beams, Taylor County Middle School
Janelle Brojakowski, Fallsburg Elementary School (Lawrence County)
Dionna Collins, Johnson Central High School (Johnson County)
Kimberly Cook, Spencer County High School
Ronda Cox, Spencer County Middle School
Latanza Garvin, Paul Laurence Dunbar High School (Fayette County)
Erin Grace, Rockcastle County High School
Katie Hale, Ponderosa Elementary School (Boyd County)
Heather Hayen, Chenoweth Elementary School (Jefferson County)
Melissa Anne Hopkins, Cedar Grove Elementary School (Bullitt County)
Dylan Howard, Paducah Middle School (Paducah Independent)
Caylen Knight, Randall K. Cooper High School (Boone County)
Bree Massie, Frederick Douglass High School (Fayette County)
Elizabeth Minix, Breathitt County (Districtwide)
Laura Pratt, Paducah Head Start (Paducah Independent)
Bridget Powell, Central Elementary School (Marshall County)
Stacy R. Stockdale, Owensboro Innovation Academy (Owensboro Independent)
Becky Wright, Henry County High School
