Courtney Bush – Sharon Elementary

Courtney is an amazing kindergarten teacher. From large class sizes, to low income students, to language barriers and beyond – she finds a way to teach each child on a level they can understand often having to write three to four lesson plans for the same class. She is always excited to come to work, and shares her amazing ability to love and her spunky attitude with all. Everyone in the school knows and loves her. When you are scared and feeling low, she will be the first to support you and encourage you. Her students love her and every year her former students run to hug her, and tell her they miss her. They remember to thank her for being such an amazing teacher and teaching them to LOVE learning. Often times Kindergarten teachers are overlooked, but it is in Kindergarten that students learn to love or hate school. She supports parents offering different ides of helping their child at home. She builds the self-esteem of every child. Courtney also amazingly supports the other teachers at Sharon Elementary. She reassures them when things are hard, and builds them up and believes in them. With Courtney Bush at your side miracles can happen.

–Pamela Wiscombe

Mrs Bush’s school is a title one school and a lot of the kids’ families don’t have a lot of money. Because of this, Mrs Bush worked with her extended family to sponsor a toy drive for the children in the school and kids were able to come to the school the week before Thanksgiving and pick out toys, clothes and food to take home to their family. Every family got a turkey. Some kids got their first bikes, some got a pair of boots, gloves or a coat that fit. The room was full of humble, grateful and deserving families who because of Mrs Bush’s love and hard work got something for Christmas. She spends a lot of her own money to make sure her classroom has the supplies needed for her kids to succeed.

More than that, she works tirelessly to make sure her more than 60 kindergarteners get the support and experience they need to learn and grow. Even though some people show up not even speaking English, her kids consistently leave with exceptionally high test scores, ready to excel in first grade. It’s more than the test scores though, Mrs Bush teaches her kids how to behave, love and work hard.

She provides them with experiences to help them in their lives. She brings in members from the community to talk to her class and give them hands-on experiences. Some of the kids have difficult home lives and she tries to be sympathetic to their situation and help them through it. One of the community leaders she brought in was a cop, but a lot of the kids were scared of him and crying because they see cops when their parents are getting arrested or deported. She had the cop just give them candy and hugs and talk to them about how cops are their friends and just there to help instead of going into the details of his job like the other community leaders had.

She works tirelessly until six or seven every day and gets up early and does it all again. She is in charge of student council – which is the fifth and sixth grade kids – even though she teaches kindergarten and since she is always willing to step up and do so well the school put her as the lead for her grade after just her student teaching at the school. The kids love her and I love her. I have never heard of a teacher who does more for her kids than she does.

–Jessica Wilde