BLINN PROFESSOR ESSIE CHILDERS HONORED
Blinn College Humanities Professor Essie Childers was recently honored with the College Reading and Learning Association’s (CRLA) Distinguished Teaching Award for her lifelong commitment to education.
An educator for 28 years, Childers was recognized as a professional who exemplifies teaching and learning as a lifelong journey. The CRLA noted that Childers provides her students with a clear model of enthusiastic, knowledgeable and compassionate teaching and encourages them to persevere and achieve interdependence.
“I was surprised and so honored to receive this award from my peers,” Childers said. “It is a passion of mine to help students discover the joy and excitement in reading.”
The CRLA is a group of student-oriented professionals active in reading, learning assistance, developmental education, tutoring and mentoring at the college or adult level. It provides a forum for the interchange of ideas, methods and information to improve student learning and facilitate professional growth for its members.
Childers was nominated for the award by Deborah Spradlin, a former colleague at Tyler Junior College, where Childers taught developmental reading before coming to Blinn in 2007.
“To say that Mrs. Childers ‘provided her students with a clear model of enthusiastic, knowledgeable and compassionate teaching’ is a gross understatement,” Spradlin wrote in the nomination letter. “Without a doubt, Essie is a most deserving recipient of this award. … Teaching just seems to be in her blood and students are drawn to listen to what she has to say.”
Childers is a graduate of Abilene Christian University and the University of Texas at Tyler. Earlier this year she was named president-elect of the Texas Community College Teachers Association (TCCTA) and a 2013 On Course Ambassador of the Year for founding the Young Ladies Success Seminar, an annual one-day conference intended to instill a college-going culture in middle and high school girls. Story and photo courtesy of Blinn College.