Ten Students Interviewed for Teaching Fellows Scholarship

Ten Leesville seniors attended the district interviews for the teaching fellows scholarship, a $6500 per year scholarship awarded to future North Carolina teachers.

Teachers, WCPSS employees, and community members interviewed Michelle Meehan, Katie Putnam, Katie Fair, Erin Takano, Jada Mayo, Elizabeth Hawyrluk, Jenna Polleck, Kelly Dunham, Sarah Beth Duncan and Pierre Lourens for the scholarship.  The interviews began at 11:15 a.m. on Nov. 2.

After sitting in a WCPSS waiting room and encouraging fellow students, each student rose upon hearing his or her name.

Question topics ranged from the economic crisis to individual strengths and weaknesses.

“The questions were definitely hard,” said Putnam. “I was nervous, but once I was in the room, I was fine.  Other than some curve balls, the practice questions prepared me pretty well.”

If awarded the scholarship, teaching fellows attend any of 17 North Carolina universities.  Private schools are required to match each scholarship dollar for dollar, totaling $13,000 annually for fellows at private universities.

“Having 17 colleges to choose from actually helps.  It breaks down your choices,” said Dunham.  Dunham plans to attend either University of North Carolina at Greensboro or East Carolina University.

In return for the monetary loan, fellows must ‘pay back’ the money by agreeing to teach in NC public schools for at least four years.

Regional finalists, selected from the Nov. 2 interview, will be able to check online if they can move to the next level on Jan. 19, 2009.

Those students still eligible for the scholarship then go to regional screening later in the year.

Pierre Lourens, 2009-2010 co-Editor-in-Chief

Pierre Lourens served for The Mycenaean in 2008-2009 as a staff writer. In that year, he took on the project of creating the first online edition of The Mycenaean. The following year, he was a co-Editor-in-Chief with Amy Kreis.