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Megan Jenny
32 Plays2 years ago
Megan Jenny is a National Board Certified Teacher in Baton Rogue, Louisiana. She recently maintained her National Board Certification while going to school for her doctorate degree. Listen to Megan tell her story of achievement, and get some tips for going through your maintenance of certification. You can read her story in The Standard
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Transcript
Introduction of Megan Jenny
00:00:00
Speaker
Hey, everyone. Welcome back to National Board Conversations. And on this episode, we head down to South Tibetan Rouge, Louisiana to speak with Megan Jenny. She's a National Board-certified teacher who completed her maintenance and certification while also still studying for her doctorate. She leaves you with some excellent insight into her process, and we get to know her a little bit outside of the classroom. This was a fun conversation, so I won't hold you much longer. Here's Megan Jenny. Hey, Megan. Thanks for taking the time. How you doing today? Doing well. How are you, Eddie? I'm doing pretty well. You know, just, uh...
00:00:30
Speaker
Hectic time here at the National Board, as always, but you know we power in through so alone. We'll kick it off real early. Can you tell us what your current job is and give a little bit of intro yourself. Sure, right now I am a full time PhD student. And I'm also a graduate assistant for the School of Education at LSU, but I stepped
Balancing Family, PhD, and Certification
00:00:51
Speaker
out of the classroom. I have three young kids.
00:00:54
Speaker
and a husband who has a very busy travel work life. And so I stepped out of the classroom to do my PhD after I got to the point where I was about to lose my mind if I didn't make that decision somehow.
00:01:10
Speaker
A lot of work. And you did MOC along the way. Why are you doing a PhD? I did my maintenance of certification, yep. And I was very lucky with how it came together. When I first realized that my maintenance of certification was due, I kind of panicked because I was out of the classroom and didn't have a group of kids that were on my own.
00:01:37
Speaker
to, you know, do all the things you got to do you film your lesson and write about them and analyze. And so I went to my graduate advisor who she is also a board certified teacher, and she suggested that I return to my school that I had just left and we have a big
00:01:59
Speaker
population of national board teachers at our school. Our school has been supportive for years and actually through the foundation, we have a foundation with our school, through the foundation has sponsored, I don't know the exact number, but quite a few teachers. And when you walk into the school, there is a wall of pictures, about 15 to 20 teachers at any time who are current with their national board certification.
Support from School Community
00:02:27
Speaker
Oh wow, it's really awesome. Yeah, so I, my first, my daughter, my middle child, her teacher is nationally board certified Frankie.
00:02:40
Speaker
My first stop was her and I said, okay, look, this is where I'm at. I know you've done your maintenance of certification before. This is where I'm at. Can you help me out? And she was just welcomed me with open arms. I started subbing in her classroom a little bit as an opportunity to get to know the kids. And when it worked out beautifully, and that's maybe an ugly thing to say here, but her son,
00:03:08
Speaker
got in an accident and had to send a couple of days in the hospital. So I was on my own in her room for a couple of days and really got to know the kids well and the routines and ran the classroom for her while she was away. And then when it was time for me to film, it was like I had been with those kids for quite a while and it made the process a lot more smoothly. So I was very blessed to have her. And then,
00:03:37
Speaker
my third person in my village, which if we want to talk about the blog, Eddie, we can get back to that. We'll link, we'll definitely link to it in the show notes. Yeah. My third, my third national board certified teacher who was in my village was my editor, Ellen. She, her and I are both in the graduate program together. So she reads most of my papers and I read most of hers. So this was no different in that we, um,
00:04:06
Speaker
She, you know, read through my paper offered me a few suggestions for improvement and helped me kind of pull me through to the finish line through the process of the maintenance of certification. Well, that's great.
Passion for Teaching and Certification Journey
00:04:19
Speaker
So we're going to take a we're going to take a little trip back to your classroom days. Can you share why you why you ended up becoming a teacher? Oh, my gosh. I think it was just something I always wanted to do. I my first job was working as a camp counselor.
00:04:36
Speaker
like a counselor in training or whatever at a local summer camp. Then I was a swimmer in high school and so I life guarded and taught swim lessons. So I was always just around kids and enjoyed kids and enjoyed being a leader, an instructor, even if it's leading them through a camp activity or through some lessons. So it was very natural fit for me.
00:05:04
Speaker
It's something we always hear. It's either like you were something they wanted to do or something that happened on accident. It just fell into teaching. It's never like, yeah. And so, I mean, I started out my undergraduate in education and finished with my master's before I stepped into the classroom, which was a cool experience as well. That's awesome. So why did you end up pursuing a board certification?
00:05:31
Speaker
I'm just really, I set a lot of goals for myself. I'm just internally motivated. And that was a goal that I set very early on, as soon as I learned about national board certification and what it was. And I remember being frustrated that I had to have been teaching for three years before I could even start
00:05:53
Speaker
Working on the certification that ended up being out for the best because I think as a third year teacher, you're not quite where you're going to end up in terms of your skills and your practice. So I.
00:06:08
Speaker
slowed down, slowed down. And it wasn't actually until I was at my most recent school where then it was, they kind of made another push offered to support us by paying our registration for national boards. And that's when I did it. Now in the piece, you mentioned that you had an administrator that was very supportive and very helpful in your process.
00:06:37
Speaker
how helpful was it to have an administrator be in a national board certified?
00:06:42
Speaker
You know, to me, I think the national board is very recently priced and especially if you're in a state that you get, you know, an additional compensation, additional pay for it. But having that incentive of like, okay, we want you to do this process so much that we're willing to pay for it for you was huge. That was what tipped me over into, oh, I'm too busy right now, I don't have time for that. To like, you know what? If they are,
00:07:12
Speaker
this supportive if they really want to see teachers at the school be national board certified, why not?
00:07:20
Speaker
Um, so it was, it was that support and also knowing that, um, one day I was going to walk back into the school and have my picture on the wall of teachers. Right. Right. I'm like, man, every day I get to walk past that and see, um, not only to show a point of pride in myself, but also to show that my school is proud of me, that I did this, I achieved this with their support. And, um, you know, it's nice.
00:07:48
Speaker
No, that's awesome. I think other schools should do that with their MBCTs. How to go into the process, help you and as a teacher and help you grow as a teacher. In so many ways, I think.
00:08:03
Speaker
It is just such an awesome opportunity to slow down and really think about your practice teachers are busy and teachers have a lot going on and it sometimes does sound like you know doing national boards is one more thing to add to the plate one more point of business, but I really enjoyed it I really enjoyed taking.
00:08:24
Speaker
my notes from class from that week, my data. I really enjoyed filming and then watching myself back and looking and seeing, oh man, what went wrong? What went well? What can I do better? And then slowing down and having to write about it. It was just a really cool experience. And I think that experience was really doubled for me by the fact that I had two other teachers at the same time who
00:08:51
Speaker
were at my school who were also going through the process. Yeah, that's something we hear often is it's easier to do it with with a few people to help you get through it because it can be very daunting and you know work on it a little bit at a time, make sure you have a little bit of group and a mentor to help you get through the process.
00:09:09
Speaker
Absolutely, so we were mentors to each other. We were like, what do you think this question says? And how are you studying for the assessment? And do you have a tripod I can borrow to fill my lesson? Yeah, the small things, that's very helpful. Yes, and let me, do you mind watching my lesson and seeing where do you think I should start? Should I start right at the beginning and I should start five minutes in so that I can get five more minutes at the end?
00:09:38
Speaker
being that it's contained to a specific time limit. So just having two other people, and sometimes we like sat down and it was kind of like, okay, let's meet after school and let's really talk about this question. And then sometimes it was in the hallway and just very informal, like, how are you doing? You okay? What's your plan for the weekend? You know?
00:10:00
Speaker
and make sure you don't miss the deadline and this and that. It was really cool. And I think the process was a little longer. It was the I certified in the first year that the process was changed from being one year to being, how long do you have to do it now? You can do it within two or three years? You have, I believe five years to finish them. Okay. So we were completing the components as the new components were rolling out.
00:10:29
Speaker
So that was kind of cool to be part of a new class as well.
Managing Studies and Giving Advice
00:10:34
Speaker
So off the top, you mentioned that you're a PhD student and you did your maintenance certification. How did you balance all that work? Like, it sounds like it would, like, personally, it would have took me out.
00:10:44
Speaker
It might have. Don't forget that I'm not in the classroom right now. I have been treating my PhD as if it is my job because right now it is. That's the only way that I've managed to make this work. So I said earlier, I have three young kids. I work on my schoolwork while they are in school. And then when they get home, I'm a mom and it's beautiful.
00:11:13
Speaker
So I've had to kind of step back a little bit in order to make progress and to move forward. Makes sense. So Emily's is a relatively new process. It just launched in, I think, 2019, 2020. Do you have any tips for MBCTs that are going through it in the future? Man, tips. Find a village. The whole point is to find a village. Find someone who can cheer you on.
00:11:43
Speaker
Find someone who has a tripod you can share. And enjoy it. It is, to me, it was a good renewal, but it's not as rigorous as the initial certification. It's really just like doing one component instead of doing four components. And to me, it was a very good check-in, but it wasn't going back to square one.
00:12:11
Speaker
you say that was the biggest difference was that it's not as rigorous as the initial certification? I think the one component is as rigorous, but it's not four rigorous components. It's like a fourth of what you did for your initial certification. Okay.
Staying Connected with Teaching and Personal Interests
00:12:29
Speaker
And then the piece, you talk about the classroom being your element where you feel most comfortable. Why does it feel so natural for you to be in the classroom?
00:12:36
Speaker
Um, Oh gosh, that's a, it just is that I just, and, um, even now I do sub at my daughter's school. Um, both of my daughters, I sub at their school a fair bit, um, once a week, every other week, something like that, just because I love being around, um, the teachers know that they can count on me to.
00:13:02
Speaker
their lesson, but like I still get to make it my own because the actual classroom teacher is not there. So whatever the concept is, we're going to cover what I'm going to cover it in my way. I don't know. I just it's it's who I am. I'm a teacher.
00:13:17
Speaker
I like it, I like it. So on this show, we like to get a little bit personal and know you guys a little bit outside the classroom. You know, because you have teachers and people too, we like to want to emphasize that. Absolutely. So we got three questions that'll, and then we'll get out of here. Okay. What is the last movie or TV show to make you laugh out loud?
00:13:37
Speaker
Ooh, laugh out loud. I've enjoyed watching the Sex and the City reboot. Oh my God, me too. My date was a little thick, but I watched it in college in my dorm room and I'm enjoying watching it again. Yeah, it's been really good. I've enjoyed it. Like my mom watched, my mom made us watch it as a kid growing up. And so like, it's just been in my head and now like I watched the new one. I'm like, yo, this is really good. Like here, yeah, and then I'm doing really good. It's enjoyable for sure. What was your first job growing up?
00:14:06
Speaker
I talked about that already. I worked at a team with kids, assistant counselor, whatever they called it at the time. And last one, what is at the top of your bucket list currently? I got to say, I am riding in a Mardi Gras parade in New Orleans this year. So jealous.
00:14:28
Speaker
I have never done that before. We have attended Mardi Gras. We lived in New Orleans in 2007, 2008, 2009. And since then, we haven't missed a Mardi Gras with the exception of COVID years.
00:14:45
Speaker
but I'm really hoping that it's going to be a great ride and I'm really looking forward to it. That's awesome like my dad is from Louisiana and he tells me like I'm from Massachusetts and he tells me about like Mardi Gras like when to go and I'm trying to make a trip down here like to go. It's amazing. It's just such a fun time.
00:15:04
Speaker
Oh man, like my sister. I have two different personalities. I have, I have, you know, Sirius Meghan that gets her work done. And I have Mardi Gras Meghan where I just let it all go and, and have fun and dance in the streets and talk to strangers. And it's a good time. Perfect. Alliteration. Mardi Gras Meghan. Exactly. Exactly. All right. Well, those are the questions I have for you. Thank you so much for taking the time. This was a lot of fun. I really enjoyed speaking to you.
00:15:33
Speaker
Thank you, Eddie. Appreciate it. You definitely have to do this again. Absolutely. So much fun talking to Megan. I really enjoy speaking to NBCtees and hearing their stories. I just want to say thank you again to Megan for taking the time to chat with me, and thank you for listening to National Board Conversation. Be sure to follow us on social media for all your National Board related updates, and we'll see you next time.