As a school social worker, Whitfield-Shanklin directly serves students and regularly collaborates with school personnel, parents, and families to best meet the social and emotional needs of students.  Whitfield-Shanklin has received grants from the Chicago Foundation for Education, LAN, and the Oppenheimer Foundation to involve the students in more creative projects that enhance their social skills. Ms. Whitfield-Shanklin volunteers much of her free time to serving the profession through various volunteer and mentoring projects. While serving, working, volunteering, and mentoring with and for others, Whitfield Shanklin is certain to find time to relax with her husband, children, and extended family.

Erik has received grants from the Chicago Foundation for Education, Boundless Readers, Oppenheimer, and Target for his classroom.  He is a National Board Certified Teacher with a Middle Childhood Generalist endorsement.  Erik was selected in the Pathways to Leadership program in the Chicago Public Schools and has served as a Differentiation Coach.  He shares his teaching expertise and talents at educational fair workshops.

Heather Madden has taught in the Chicago Public Schools for the last ten years.  As an early childhood special education teacher, she has met the needs of preschool aged children with diagnosed special needs.  For the first six years of her career, Heather worked in an instructional special education classroom, but has spent the last few years within a fully inclusive, team-taught Blended classroom.  Heather and her co-teacher merge project-based learning, the Reggio-Emilia approach, and Montessori methods into a successful learning environment. 

Heather has received recognition for her dedication to the field of education as one of the 2010 recipients of the Kohl-McCormick Early Childhood Teaching Awards, the Feldman Leadership Award from Elmhurst College, and The Pride of the Union Award from the Chicago Teacher’s Union.  In addition, Heather was granted over $10,000 in grants from Donors Choose for classroom materials.

Jeanne Andersen-Bakula was named a Golden Apple Scholar in 1999. She double majored in Education and Music at Lake Forest College. In 2003, Jeanne was hired to teach fourth grade at Schubert School in CPS. Two years later, she became a music teacher. Since that time, she has been a music teacher, choir director, and trombone teacher.  Jeanne has also earned her ESL endorsement and received her M.Ed in Literacy, Language and Culture at UIC and is now qualified to be a Reading Specialist.

In 2001, Jeanne volunteered in Hong Kong through the YMCA to teach English at summer adventure camps. In 2004, she traveled to Jamaica with NEIU and conducted early literacy parent workshops and independent research on adolescent girls. Jeanne has received Rochelle Lee Grants for her classroom library and purchased music resources with a Donor’s Choose grant. Jeanne has trained Schubert teachers on Jerry Johns’ Basic Reading Inventory; she has also given the following presentations at Golden Apple conferences: MUSIC: Making Use of Skills in the Classroom and Travel Abroad: Teach Abroad.

Jessica Eaton became a teacher with Chicago Public Schools five years ago after graduating with a B.A. in Education from Saint Mary’s College in South Bend, Indiana.  She was hired as a second grade teacher at Nicholson Technology Academy located in Chicago’s Englewood neighborhood. After teaching second grade for a year, Jessica moved up with her students and began teaching third grade; she has remained here ever since. Jessica also went back to school and received her Master’s degree in Education through National Louis University. This program helped her to earn her Reading Specialist certification and provided her with a wealth of knowledge surrounding literacy.

Outside of teaching, Jessica’s other main passion is grant writing. She has earned several grants through Chicago Foundation for Education and the Boundless Readers Organization that have provided her with funds for her classroom as well as opportunities to collaborate with other colleagues across the city as a means to improve her instructional practices. Jessica has also received many Donor’s Choose grants that have provided her students with everything from chapter books to math games and everything in between.

While at Nicholson, Ms. Thigpen returned to school to pursue her Type 75 certificate to be an Assistant Principal or Principal. As a result of her hard work and determination she was offered the Assistant Principal position at Nicholson Elementary School, where she currently serves in a dual teaching and administrative role.  During the day she teaches four grade math and science, and in the late afternoon, she performs administrative duties.  She has been a Chicago Foundation of Education Grant Recipient.   She has been at Nicholson for the past 9 years and she is very excited about the evolution of the school and the years ahead. 

Mai Hong became a teacher in Chicago Public Schools in 2009 through the Chicago Teaching Fellows program after graduating from University of California, Los Angeles with a B.A. in Political Science. She will graduate with a MAT from Dominican University in December 2010. She has student taught math in public schools on Chicago’s South and West sides, and is currently teaching sixth grade math on Chicago’s West side.

Mai has received several grants to further student achievement in the classroom. In the summer of 2010, Mai traveled to Saigon, Vietnam with Southeast Asian Leadership Network (SEALnet) to create and teach an English curriculum at an all-boys orphanage. She also worked with other teachers at her school and in CPS to develop a service-learning curriculum to use in the classroom.

Megan Freeman is a General Education teacher in a Chicago Public School where she team-teaches in a preschool blended classroom setting. Megan attended and graduated from the Early Childhood Education Program at Columbia College Chicago where she became a Golden Apple Scholar. After graduation, Megan moved to Seattle, Washington to serve her country as an AmeriCorps member where she worked as a literacy tutor and donation and event coordinator for a Seattle Public School.

This will be Megan’s third year teaching preschool in the Chicago Public Schools.  She has obtained several grants to encourage and supplement her teaching. These include over $600 in materials through Donorschoose.org and a Boundless Readers, Rochelle Lee Teacher Award grant for bolstering her classroom library.

Tanginia May became a teacher for the Chicago Public Schools in 2004 and has taught pre-k, kindergarten, and second grade in both general education and special education settings. She has a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Truman State University and a master’s degree in early childhood education from Northern Illinois University.  Over her six years as a teacher she has received several grants from the Chicago Foundation for Education and the Rochelle Lee Fund. 

Tanginia is currently an Early Childhood Special Education teacher at McClellan Elementary and works with pre-k and kindergarten students with autism.  She serves on the Instructional Leadership Team and has been a mentor for other special education teachers.  She has also led several professional development sessions for the staff regarding inclusion and techniques for working with students with autism. 

Zorel Zambrano became a teacher in Chicago Public Schools in 2008 trough Chicago Teaching Fellows after having worked in the school system for three years, first as an special education aide and then as a program coordinator.  She holds a B.A. in Psychology from Beloit College and a Master of Arts in Teaching from National-Louis University.  Zorel taught second grade her first year and then switched to special education. She currently teaches K-3^rd bilingual special education at Lloyd Elementary.

Zorel has recently become interested in the world of grants and the countless opportunities they provide for teachers to improve their practice and acquire more resources.  She has received grants for her classroom through Donors Choose, Boundless Readers, and is now working with the Chicago Foundation of Education.