Wood View Teacher is VFW’s Illinois Teacher of The Year

Editor's Note: The following is a release from the Valley View School District.

teacher Nancy Anding is the Veterans of Foreign Wars’ Illinois elementary school Citizenship Education Teacher of the Year.

The first grade teacher, a resident of , received the award from VFW State Commander William Phillips and Bolingbrook Post 5917 Commander George Foy during the Bolingbrook Village Board meeting Tuesday.

“This award is given to teachers for what they do in the classroom,” Phillips said. “It’s a tribute to Nancy to be selected. Thank you, Nancy, for what you do for students.”

Anding, who has taught in the district since 1998, has already been named Post 5917’s K-5 Teacher of the Year as well as the VFW District Teacher of the Year. She will now be considered, along with 51 other nominees, for VFW United States Teacher of the Year.

Nominated for the award by Wood View Principal Mark Stange, Anding annually sponsors activities in which her students research their families’ military backgrounds and create ancestral scrapbooks. She also sponsors letter-writing campaigns to soldiers serving overseas, organizes the Wood View Take a Vet to School Day, annual Veteran’s Day activities and food drives for veterans.

“Mrs. Anding is first and foremost a genuine patriot,” Stange wrote in his nomination letter. “As an American educator, she espouses the qualities of patriotism in all she does. In her role as a teacher, she plans activities for her class that promote American values.”

“A well-rounded education for children includes being a well-rounded, responsible citizen,” Anding said in accepting the award. “I am humbled and honored.”

Anding and her husband, Kim, have two daughters, Jennifer Glowacki ( Class of 2001) and Kelsey (BHS Class of 2007).