Teacher Tuesday – Meet Ms. Williams!

Meet Ms. Williams

Ms. Williams teaches Business and Information Technology and serves as the yearbook adviser at Swanson Middle School.  Ms. Williams has taught in the same classroom at Swanson for the past 12 years.

Born into a family of educators, Ms. Williams believes that teaching has always been in her blood.  “Ever since I was little, I wanted to be a teacher.  Both my mom and grandma were teachers, so teaching is in my blood. Growing up, I would always go in to work with my mom over the summer to help her set up her business lab at the high school she taught at; though I ended up sleeping on the desks a lot of the time after I finished whatever she told me to do.  My mom would be the one who inspired and inspires me with my career.  Since she has gone through exactly what I am going through it’s nice to be able to talk to her about what she did when she taught.  Plus, I’m just a big kid at heart; just ask any of my students.”

Ms. Williams has both joys and challenges in her job. “The greatest joy of my job is getting to meet a vast majority of the students through either the classes that I teach, taking pictures of the different events at Swanson, or coaching the amazing swim team.  The biggest challenge is constantly trying to keep the things that I do in class as interesting and relevant to the students based on what the competencies (standards) the state has us use for the different Career and Technical classes.”  How does she keep herself motivated and challenged to be the best teacher that she can be?  “My students motivate and challenge me to be the best teacher that I can be.  If I’m having a bad day, they have a way of making it better; whether it’s just being quiet for a few minutes, or saying, “It’ll be alright Ms. Williams; there’s always tomorrow.”

When asked for her thoughts on what makes her job important, Ms. Williams replied, “I think that business classes, and Career and Technical Education as a whole, are so important to students because we teach hands-on-skills that have a direct effect on our students.  In our classes we are not only teaching them life skills, but how they can use the things they learn in other classes in a real-life context.”

What advice would Ms. Williams give others aspiring to teach?  “To anyone that is looking to go into teaching or coaching, the best advice that I can give is to learn to have patience and respect for differences.  It will get you far, no matter what you decide to do.”

If Ms. Williams were not teaching, her dream job would be to work for Disney.  “If I wasn’t a schoolteacher, I think that my dream job would probably be working as a cast member or an imaginer for Disney. I think that would be so cool to be in the happiest place on Earth watching the joy and fascination on people’s faces when they enter and move around the park.