Teachers Of The Year Announced For Hoover City Schools

HOOVER, AL — Hoover City Schools announced the recipients of each school's Teacher of the Year for the year, and named the system's elementary and secondary Teachers of the Year.

The Teachers of the Year recipients include:

Elementary/Intermediate

• Bluff Park: Gerri Evans (Named Elementary School Teacher of the Year)
• Brock's Gap: Lisa Sparkman
• Deer Valley: Samantha Thrasher
• Green Valley: Melissa Wilcox
• Greystone: Anna Tow
• Gwin: Kelley Feagin
• Riverchase: Courtney Beam
• Rocky Ridge: Jennifer Manley
• Shades Mountain: Elizabeth Lochamy
• South Shades Crest: Karen Pirkle
• Trace Crossings: Celeste Burton

Middle

• R.F. Bumpus: Jasmine Jenkins
• Berry: Tory Hixon
• Simmons: Sarah Cox

High

• Hoover: Paul McEwan (Named Secondary teacher of the Year)
• Spain Park: Joy Gonzalez
• RC3: Andy Poker

Bluff Park Elementary School teacher Gerri Evans is the the 2022-2023 Elementary Teacher of the Year for Hoover City Schools. Evans is a STEAM teacher and has taught at BPES since 2016. Her principal describes her as a master educator with a fearless approach to education, as well as a mentor to other STEAM teachers in the district.

Evans is known for her innovative and engaging STEAM student learning strategies and for consistently meeting with teachers and district leaders to collaborate and improve her craft. Evans has been with Hoover City Schools for 20 years and has a true passion for education. She has focused her time outside of school on Girls in STEM and has played an instrumental role in the Girls Engaged in Math and Science (GEMS) organization in Hoover for the past six years.

She was recently named as a 2020 state finalist for the prestigious Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching.

Paul McEwan was named the Secondary Teacher of the Year for Hoover City Schools. McEwan has taught at Hoover High Sschool since 2006 and is currently a 9th-grade Pre-AP Biology teacher and an 11th and 12th-grade International Baccalaureate Biology teacher. He is known by his colleagues as someone who makes a difference in the classroom and in the lives of students, and an educator with innovative teaching practices who encourages students to think critically.

McEwan is a certified trainer for Argument-Driven Inquiry (ADI) and provides professional development for science teachers across the nation. He was selected as Alabama’s 2021 Outstanding Biology Teacher of the Year. McEwan wants to be remembered as a teacher who demanded a lot from students but fiercely supported them every step of the way.

Members of the selection committee for Hoover City Schools Teacher of the Year say both Evans and McEwan have a wealth of experience and are held in high regard by their peers, and their teaching places a high level of emphasis on student engagement and technology integration. Evans and McEwan will now represent Hoover in the 2022 Alabama Teacher of the Year competition.