Suzannah Holsenbeck, TAC '09, High School English

Facts:

Shortly after graduating from Yale University, Suzannah Holsenbeck joined Teach For America and taught special education at a high school on the Rosebud Sioux Lakota Reservation in South Dakota. The students she taught were often the first in their families to reach high school. Teaching, Suzannah has noted, was what always got her out of bed in the morning, looking forward to greeting her students and helping them reach high academic goals. Suzannah also coached the school's speech team, and she brought some of the first American Indian students in twenty years to compete in the South Dakota State Finals.

After moving back East, Suzannah taught science in two urban elementary schools in West Haven, Connecticut. She was inspired by younger students' enthusiasm and wonder. Suzannah applied to TAC because she realized that education was her path and she felt that she owed it to herself and her students to be prepared with as many tools for learning and teaching as possible. She wanted to ensure that she had the necessary depths of knowledge and understanding to make this thing called teaching a sustainable endeavor. She is committed to teaching students who are severely underserved by the public system.

Inside Scoop:

"Teaching is something that I cannot not do. I look forward to seeing my students every day, despite the 5:30am wake up time, despite the sometimes hour and a half commute to work, and the tragedies that inevitably occur throughout the year. I have seen firsthand the impact a teacher can have in guiding a student to success and high levels of achievement and I cannot imagine doing anything else with my life."

"I didn't expect to love the experience this much! Everything from my fellow colleagues to my professors to the readings I have to complete give me sustenance and inspiration as an educator. We do such important work and it is nice to be in a place where that is valued."

"I learned a tremendous amount about the teaching of English in my methods class this fall, most fundamentally concerning the necessity of purpose when planning a lesson. I have also reveled in reading about education from sociological, anthropological and critical race perspectives, and these more abstract arenas have enriched my thinking as an educator insofar as I now have a strong framework with which to address the challenges of urban teaching."

"I really loved working with a teaching team this past summer in the Cambridge Harvard Summer Academy. Having more leaders in the classroom gave me more time to hone my skills and really get to know my students, as opposed to just grading papers and worrying about what I was going to do for 80 minutes each day. Having partners in this endeavor reiterated how powerful teaching can be when we collaborate with others."