Fraser Public Schools names Teachers of the Year

FRASER — At Fraser Public Schools, three teachers won the Teacher of the Year award, which came as a shock and a surprise for all three of them.

The teachers are Kaitlin King at Fraser High School, Jacquelyn Carter at Richards Middle School and Kerry Engle at Disney Elementary School.

All three schools asked teachers to nominate colleagues for the award. One teacher is chosen at each level, and each school holds separate celebrations for the winners. They will also be celebrated at a school board meeting in May and at a Macomb Intermediate School District banquet at the end of April.

Engle has been teaching in the Fraser district for 19 years and also taught at a private school previously. She said she’s had a good experience at Fraser so far and called it home.

Engle said that each year, a different elementary school is chosen to participate in the nominations. The award win for her was a complete surprise.

“Nobody talked to me about their nominations, and I didn’t really talk to anybody about their nominations,” Engle said.

She said the job is a calling though it can be challenging.

“It’s one thing to be nominated by somebody who doesn’t really know what you do, but to be nominated by people who, who are with you all of the time who watch you as an educator and watch you as a professional, that really made me feel just honored that they would think that I was doing such a good job that I could be thought of as Teacher of the Year,” Engle said.

She said she appreciates her colleagues for nominating her and suggested that the award could have been given to any of them.

Carter said at her school, a committee of previous award recipients chose the Teacher of the Year. She said she was very surprised to win. At her staff meeting, her husband and children came to the school to celebrate her award as well as her parents, in-laws and friends over a video call. She’s been teaching in Fraser for 13 years.

Her students were excited for her and the committee contacted them to get feedback.

“They all wrote testimonials of what Teacher of the Year meant to them and why they felt I was deserving of that title and then six students stayed after school and read their testimonials at our staff meeting in front of the staff and my family to share with me why they think I was deserving of Teacher of the Year,” Carter said.

She said she cried during the staff meeting.

“I was overcome with emotion,” Carter said. “I felt so much love from the students and for the students and from the staff and it was definitely one of the best days of my teaching career.”

Carter also was nominated for and was named the Macomb County Middle School Outstanding Teacher of the Year. Those who won Teacher of the Year move out onto another selection process and they have to fill out more information on a form. The form is sent to the MISD for review. She said the award wasn’t even on her radar.

She is grateful, honored and humbled for the experience.

“It means so much to me that they value me, and they see what I’m doing every day and that they give me an opportunity to learn and grow with them,” Carter said. “I am just incredibly thankful.”

King said there was an after-school celebration to announce her award, something they do every year. She also said she knew she was nominated. This will be her 11th year teaching.

“Then my face went up on the giant screen,” King said. “And they had a student introduce and speak a little about me.”

She was very surprised.

“I did not expect to win,” King said.

King said she was very shocked, appreciative and grateful in the moment.

When she first started teaching, she said she wasn’t sure she was going to make it, but in the last few years her perspective changed.

“I could see myself teaching for a long time,” King said. “For now, I see myself staying as a classroom teacher. I enjoy it. I like my day-to-day with my classes and the difference I’m making there.”

King said her students were very excited for her and she thanked her colleagues for their nomination.

“I’m only as good as I am, you know, as me working with them,” King said. “So I definitely couldn’t do this job without them or in isolation. So they are part of why I am the teacher I am today and can continue to be.”