2020 Scholarship Recipient: Perla Villatoro

(More about Perla)

​

UPDATES

March 4, 2025

On some good news we had a lot of Black History Month focused events at my school. I try to do at least one cultural focused lesson during recognition months and I am attaching a picture of some of the results (look left)! Students created a blackout poem within a text from an important Black voice that was needed during our time. We focused on Sojourner Truth, Maya Angelou, and Killer Mike.

​

November, 2024

We are one week away from thanksgiving break and I could not be more excited for a week off. While I am exhausted and overwhelmed I genuinely cannot imagine myself doing something else!

 

We are working on our third unit, we have read The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros, Night by Elie Wiesel, and Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi. I love getting to teach them these new perspectives and voices. I’ve slowly build up my classroom library with great inclusive texts and I’m hoping to fill a tallbookshelf before the end of the school year!

 

I try to look at the positives from day to day. The kids are genuinely what keeps me going. I am attaching a few images of a letter a student wrote to me. It happened to be a very hard teacher day and out of nowhere, this student bring this to my desk. (See photos to left) 

​

August 17, 2024

This Thursday marks two weeks as being an official teacher! My students and my co-teacher are great! I have some bad days as a teacher where I want to cry, but the next day is always so fulfilling, and I'm grateful for my job. It is a weird dynamic, but I'm looking forward to what will come. 

 

I started my 4th master's course for my degree and learned that I was accepted into the gifted endorsement class offered by my district, which is free of charge. It is going to be a jam-packed year, but I'm ready! 

 

Every year, on the first day of school, our media specialists take "the first day of teaching" photos for all staff (see photo to the left)

​​

​