(Submitted by Bowling Green Kiwanis)
The fourth annual Kiwanis Inspirational Educator Award program will be held in February, a month devoted to educators in the Bowling Green city schools.
These outstanding teachers have been peer selected by their colleagues for their exceptional impact on their students as well as their fellow teachers and will be honored during February luncheon meetings. During the meetings, each teacher will give a presentation devoted to their approach to teaching within their disciplines.
The awards have been supported by numerous organizations – Bowling Green city school PTOs, the Chamber of Commerce, Downtown Bowling Green and Bowling Green City Schools. With their support, each honoree will receive a monetary award and have their names engraved on a plaque on permanent display in a school library.
This year, the three teachers who been selected by their colleagues are Jessica Swonger, Bruce Corrigan and Jenny Dever.
Jessica Swonger is a graduate of the University of Akron where she earned a Bachelor of Arts in Visual Arts Education. She began her teaching career with the Akron Area YMCA as a preschool teacher and K-5 after school tutor. Before BGCS she was a High School Art Teacher for one year at Cuyahoga Falls High School in Cuyahoga Falls, OH.
This will be her 4th year with BGCS. Jessica went into education because she has always been interested in helping others. She was a member of her high school Key Club and continued her philanthropic efforts as a collegiate member and officer (and current Life Member) of the National Honorary Band Fraternity Kappa Kappa Psi. By participating in those and other volunteer-focused organizations throughout her academic career, she felt education was a natural choice.
Swonger had always been told by her teachers that she had a natural artistic talent … but ironically, throughout middle and high school she took mostly music courses, not art courses. She learned very quickly in high school that she was a much better artist than musician, which ultimately led her to Visual Arts education and not Music Education. However, she lives vicariously through her husband, Dan Swonger, who is a middle and high school band and choir teacher in Continental, OH.
She reports that she is driven by the 500 smiling faces that walk through her art room door at Conneaut Elementary and loves seeing students tackle challenges, find their favorite art media to work with and surprise themselves with what they can do to discover who they are as a person through the arts.
Bruce Corrigan is in his 31st year of teaching. He is a band director for BG Schools, and teaches 410 band students at both the Middle School and High School. He holds bachelor and master degrees from Indiana University. Corrigan’s bands have performed at the OMEA Conference in Cleveland, the OAE conference in Toledo, the BGSU Band Clinic, the ABSDA state conference in Columbus, an Indianapolis Colts game, and most recently at Disney World.
He is a member of Phi Beta Mu, the American School Band Directors Association, the Percussive Arts Society, and the Ohio Music Educators Association. He has served as board member for the MidAmerican Center for Contemporary Music, assistant conductor of the BG Area Community Band. Ludwig Masters’s publications have published several of his works for concert band, small ensembles and solo books.
Bruce is married to Julie, and they have three children – Megan Craig, and Luke. Megan and her husband are both band directors in Indiana. Craig is an elementary teacher in Toledo and Luke is a sophomore at BGSU. Bruce and Julie have two grandchildren.
Jenny Dever is a 23-year English teacher at Bowling Green High School. She teaches AP English, Academic Writing and English 12. She earned a BS in English Education from Ohio State University and an MA in English from BGSU and is a proud recipient of the 2010 Martha Holden Jennings Scholar Award.
About her love for teaching she remarked, “It’s the kids! I love to be around them and watch them achieve!” Her colleagues agree that she has a passion for student achievement both in and out of the classroom.
A recent proud achievement was when Jenny saw a need for and formed a Gay-Straight Alliance Club in 2010 which she still advises. Dever says her life is family, school and gardening. She wants to plant the seeds that grow and bloom into beautiful things.
While some consider themselves as writing teachers, Dever considers herself as a teacher of writers allowing students to use their creative talents to reach their full potential. Some of her colleagues have remarked that Jenny has a “take charge” attitude in that she organizes department meetings, develops new courses when needed and in general gets things done in a timely fashion.
