Redondo Beach Teacher Honored As LA County Teacher Of The Year

REDONDO BEACH, CA — The Los Angeles County Office of Education Thursday released its list of the 10 Teachers of the Year, naming a Redondo Beach middle school teacher one of the top local educators.

Los Angeles County Superintendent of Schools Debra Duardo announced the honorees in a virtual ceremony broadcast on social media.

• Leslie Spainhower of Adams Middle School in the Redondo Beach Unified School District
• Hazel Kight Witham of Venice High School in the Los Angeles Unified School District
• Timothy Green of Highland High School in the Antelope Valley Union High School District
• Maria Sims of Azusa High School in the Azusa Unified School District
• Wendy Payan of Sierra Vista High School in the Baldwin Park Unified School District
• Ericca Dent of Joaquin Miller Elementary School in the Burbank Unified School District
• Annie Paliza of Keppel Academy in the Keppel Union School District
• Rhiannon Chavez of 186th Street Elementary School in the Los Angeles Unified School District
• Dan Calma of D.D. Johnson Elementary School in the Norwalk-La Mirada Unified School District
• Jim Klipfel of Saugus High School in the William S. Hart Union High School District

Each of the award winners will receive $1,000 from the California Credit Union, the award's main sponsor.

The top 10 educators in the county were selected from a field of 48 teachers representing 44 districts, and all participants were recently selected as teacher(s) of the year by their respective school districts, Duardo said.

Contestants participated in interviews, submitted essays, lesson plans and other materials to judging panels comprised of their peers.

The Los Angeles County winners now advance to the California Teachers of the Year competition this fall.

Spainhower teaches Language Arts at Adams Middle School in Redondo Beach. She grew up in the Bay Area. She completed her undergrad and first MA at Abilene Christian University in Texas and earned her teaching credential and MA in Teaching at UC Irvine.

In a video shared with Patch, Spainhower described what the pandemic has done to middle school students and how creating a live class helps connect them. She feels motivated by the challenge.

"Something that has helped motivate me and that I think about a lot is that students also feel really challenged by this," Spainhower said. "They are missing connection even more than I am. Their interactions with me and their interactions with their peers are really important, especially when you're 13 and friends are the most important thing to you in a lot of ways."

Kight Witham from Venice High told KCRW in March that she holds Zoom conference hours, incorporates voice conferencing and other online tools to work with students while they are not physically together and continue distance learning.

"We no longer have any control over our student's learning environment," she told KCRW, describing challenges that students face with connecting and how teachers are trying to reach them.

The LA native earned a bachelor's degree in English and American Literature from Brown University and a Master of Fine Arts from Antioch University Los Angeles.

Recognizing VHS’s and LAUSD Teacher of the Year Hazel Kight Witham with her husband Drake Witham, a teacher at VHS, and a former recipient Kirsten Farrell. Go Gondo! pic.twitter.com/KK1aKvnwKP
— Venice High Gondoliers (@VHSGondos) October 1, 2020

The state is scheduled to announce its five co-winners in October and one out of those five will be selected to represent California in the National Teacher of the Year contest in the spring.

"During this time of extraordinary challenges to our school communities, it is especially important that we pay tribute to our outstanding teachers who, in the face of a pandemic, are bringing care, compassion and ingenuity to their virtual classrooms," Duardo said.

"I am truly impressed by their innovative practices and the partnerships they are building to keep students learning and thriving."

Additionally, a yearlong social media campaign is being developed by LACOE to uplift teachers by encouraging people to use Twitter, Instagram and Facebook to share how teachers have made a difference in their lives, Duardo said.

People can participate by adding the hashtags #LACoTeachers and #MyTeacher to their posts.

- City News Service and Patch Editor Nicole Charky contributed to this report.

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