Excellent Educators is a WAVY-TV 10 initiative to celebrate local teachers who have gone above and beyond for their students and communities during the last academic year. These Excellent Educators were nominated by their school divisions. Congratulations to these educators for all of their hard work and accomplishments!
VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (WAVY) – This year’s Excellent Educator from Virginia Beach comes to us from Landstown High School. His name is Paul Smith.
What the school division had to say about this Excellent Educator:
Landstown High School would like to nominate Mr. Paul Smith for the Excellent Educators series because of his commitment to our students and the positive impact he has made on the culture of our school. Mr. Smith teaches AP Calculus and is the sponsor for our chapter of the national math honor society. When interviewing his students, there was a common message shared that described Mr. Smith as a caring and engaging teacher that makes every student feel valued. Mr. Smith loves to include humor into his teaching and focuses on learning about each of his students’ needs. When you go into his classroom, you will find his students deeply connected to what he is teaching, asking questions, sharing ideas, and connecting with each other. He has multiple students who have identified him as their trusted adult, and Mr. Smith has made just as strong of a rapport with his colleagues. When he isn’t teaching a class, you will almost always find him providing students assistance and staying after school on Wednesdays to tutor anyone who needs extra help. Mr. Smith is a true reflection of our school division’s focus on providing every student with a safe learning environment and a high quality educational experience.
Paul Smith nomination from VB Schools
WAVY-TV’s Katie Collett had the opportunity to interview Mr. Smith. He tells her he began his teaching career in 2007 at Landstown High School, and he has been there ever since. Smith admits, he didn’t plan on becoming a teacher when he was a child.
“I actually planned to do other things, and then I kind of stumbled into teaching somewhere in, I’d say, kind of leaving high school. Then, in college, I liked helping my classmates study, and I liked helping to kind of do stuff, and I was just generally kind of good at things, and I just kind of enjoyed that process of like, I know stuff. I want to help you know stuff, and I was like, I can do that. I’ll go into teaching,” said Smith.
While Landstown High School administrators say students find Mr. Smith to be caring and engaging, Smith says one of his favorite parts of the job is actually learning from his students.
“One of the biggest things that I love about this job is I get to come in and I get to learn all this stuff that I don’t know all the time. All of these students have tons of information and tons of knowledge and tons of stuff that they’re good at, and they know, and I would just like to talk about or something like, I don’t know what that is. I really want to listen to that.”
Listening to his students is something Smith says he is happy to do. He believes that may be why so many students consider him their trusted adult.
“I am currently talking a bunch about myself. I don’t usually talk as much as I listen, and I also am caring with what I hear and what I do with the information and what I have.”
If a child confides him he says he sets expectations right away.
“I’ll listen. If there’s things that I need to tell other people, I will tell other people. So you know that ahead of time. So, you are free to give me information, or not, your choice, but I’ll be here to listen. I’ll give you advice if you want it. If you just want to set of ears, I can be a set of ears. I don’t make judgments about what I hear, and that’s the biggest part.”
He says if it reaches a point where he believes a student may need help, he works to figure out if he is the right person to help. If not, he will help find someone who can.
“I’ve said this to some of my some of my students before that I am a teacher, but I try to be myself and a person first.”
Smith says in being himself, he is able to create a more fun, relaxed atmosphere in his classroom. An atmosphere that intertwines humor with education.
Smith tells WAVY.com he is honored to be selected an Excellent Educator, but he wants to make clear that so many of his colleagues are amazing at what they do, and are also deserving of the honor.
