Teacher honor a real surprise

Barry Porterfield, Pauls Valley Daily Democrat, Okla.
·2 min read

Mar. 17—Shock and disbelief were Tara Dyson's first thoughts when it was her name announced as Pauls Valley's district teacher of the year for 2021.

Initially it was difficult to process as Dyson went right to work dividing up the prizes given to the top teacher of the year moments after the ceremony on March 10.

From gift cards and various other products and services coming from a basketful donated by local businesses, Dyson was at first focused on sharing the items with the four other site teachers of the year in PV.

"They're all really, really fabulous teachers that work hard, so I thought I would share the prizes with them," Dyson said moments after learning she was the one given this year's top honor.

"I thought there's no way," she said about her expectations of winning the honor. "All of these other teachers have so much more experience than me.

"I know they all work so hard. All of them are deserving of this honor.

"I'm still processing what just happened."

A portion of Dyson's bio shows pretty clearly why she chose to be a teacher.

While growing up her childhood vacations entailed trips to Civil War battlefields and American historical sites.

Although she was an Air Force brat until the age of 13, Dyson considers Corinth, Mississippi, as home. She graduated with a bachelor's in counseling psychology from Southwestern Assemblies of God University and obtained her master's in history with honors in 2019.

"Tara's God-given passion is teaching — not necessarily the conveying knowledge on the subject aspect — but the daily interaction with students part. The kids are the best part of her job. It's just an added bonus that she gets to teach her favorite subject."

Other local site teachers of the year are Churee Chaffin, an English teacher at PV High School; Kim Thompson, a fifth grade reading teacher at Lee Elementary; Brittany Duarte, a third grad teacher at Jackson Elementary; and Lindsay Watts, a prekindergarten teacher at Jefferson Early Learning Center.

"It's a hard decision, but we couldn't do any of this without the hard work of so man," Superintendent Mike Martin said during last week's teacher announcement.