“Great teachers make a world of difference for their students, for their colleagues and for their communities,” Branstad said. “The Lt. Governor and I congratulate Jane Schmidt, who is a true role model for both students and teachers.”
Schmidt, a 33-year teaching veteran from Delmar, is an eighth-grade literacy and language arts teacher at Maquoketa Middle School in the Maquoketa Community School District.
Schmidt’s leadership extends well beyond the classroom. She serves as a teacher mentor at her school and, in a new role this fall, she coaches educators, refines curriculum and gauges the effects of teaching practices across the school district. Schmidt also will help her school district craft a teacher leadership and compensation plan, an opportunity made available by the education reform law adopted by Iowa legislators this year.
“I love schools, and I’ve never been tired of teaching,” Schmidt said. “It’s always been my passion, and it’s always given me purpose. I think that’s all we ask of a career – that, and a commitment to continuous improvement.”
Schmidt works with her students to nurture not only a love for reading and writing, but also a deep understanding of the importance of literacy. She recently shared with her students a study on college dropouts that showed a link to an inability to keep up with the reading.
Schmidt’s classes also emphasize communicating effectively, both in small groups and one on one. “In this era of texting, that face-to-face communication doesn’t always take place and it’s important,” she said.
“We hear from employers that kids don’t know how to communicate, how to talk, so it’s something we have to focus on.”
Schmidt says she was inspired to become a teacher as a teenager, when she volunteered at a summer camp for children with special needs during high school and then volunteered at a laboratory school as a freshman at Illinois State University. Her teaching roots began in special education. Through that experience, she developed a love for literacy instruction and went back to school to earn endorsements in reading and language arts.
Schmidt’s spirit of self-improvement never waned. She earned National Board Certification in 2004, after witnessing a dramatic impact the credential had on one of her own children’s teachers. In May, Schmidt earned a second master’s degree. She also has learned how to use video and other technology to incorporate digital storytelling into her classes.
“This ‘digital immigrant’ feels strongly that our instruction must include technology if we are to relate to the ‘digital natives’ in our classrooms and prepare them for the 21st century,” Schmidt wrote in her Iowa Teacher of the Year application.
Schmidt started her teaching career at a special education cooperative in Valparaiso, Ind. She taught special education in the Davenport Community School District for seven years before coming to Maquoketa in 1989. She also has been a special education consultant at Mississippi Bend Area Education Agency in Davenport. Schmidt has taught language arts and reading at Maquoketa Middle School since 1997.
Finalists for the Iowa Teacher of the Year award are:
- Aaron Maurer, a gifted education teacher and instructional coach at Bettendorf Middle School in Bettendorf
- Kari Murray, a science teacher at Carlisle High School in Carlisle
- Jon Parrott, an 8th grade social studies teacher at Urbandale Middle School in Urbandale
- Kristi Wickre, a special education teacher at Smouse Opportunity School in Des Moines (Des Moines Public Schools)
- Elaine Wolf, a culinary arts teacher at Central Campus in Des Moines (Des Moines Public Schools)
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