NEW PARIS — The National Trail Board of Education welcomed three new teachers during its meeting on Thursday, June 27.
During the meeting, NTBOE members voted to approve one-year limited contracts for Tyler Luce, Rebecca Martin, and Tyler Trick. The board invited the three to speak during public participation, but Trick could not make the meeting.
Trick is the newest seventh grade math teacher.
Martin will be a secondary English/language arts teacher for grades 11-12. She is actually Mike Eyler’s replacement, as Eyler accepted the position of NT Middle School Principal back in April.
“We had a pretty good interview, we think she’ll be a good candidate. She will fulfill all we need there,” Eyler said.
According to Superintendent Jeff Parker, Martin may not be able to teach the College Credit Plus (CCP) classes that Eyler was teaching, at least not during her first year. Parker added, they have to look into what Edison State will allow.
“I was born and raised in Miamisburg and I’ve lived there for pretty much my whole life,” Martin said. “I just recently moved to Dayton. In addition to going to school for education, for the last several years right out of Miamisburg High school, I worked in the service industry.
“When it comes to teaching my philosophy, especially when it comes to English, is based in reading, writing, workshops, strategies within the class room. Writing workshop I would say is one of my strengths. Helping students with their writing, especially when they have a lot of difficulties coming into it or some sort of negative connotations when it comes to the writing process.
“Basically showing them that they can be successful when it comes to breaking it down into little tiny pieces. As well as student choice, so giving them the choice to read books that interest them. Having journals, discussions, keeping track of their reading in the classroom — things like that,” she said.
Luce will be the sixth grade social studies teacher and varsity baseball coach.
“I taught four years at Fairborn, I was a year before that at Greenville,” he said. “I taught my first year there sixth, seventh, and eighth grade social studies, so I’ve been through all the grade levels of social studies. After my first year the school decided to go back to one grade level, where I was given sixth year social studies. That’s where I’ve been the last three years.
“Fairborn was a good place to start,” he said. “I did baseball there, I did basketball for a little bit, I did freshman and a little bit of JV. Fairborn got to the point where our class sizes were getting very large. There wasn’t any room for support for other staff. I had 28-35 in every class.
“This year I decided I was ready to update the resume and get it out there. My wife works at Greenville, she is a social worker. We just bought a house, we’ve been there a little over a year now in Clayton. At that point it was the perfect middle spot from Fairborn and Greenville. So, immediate future we’re there, but part of what we’ve talked about is our plan is at one point to teach, coach, live, and have our kids go to the same school district we’re at. We’re getting some of those pieces together here.
“I interviewed here and fell in love with the technology available to me. Everything that I didn’t have there, I seem to have gotten here. Smaller class sizes, more technology in classroom — I feel very confident in teaching sixth grade. It’s a tested subject, that’s something that’s really important to me to do well there. Baseball is just a plus for me.”
The board took the opportunity to vote on Luce for varsity baseball coach, which after some debate, passed three to one. Board member Cindy Lee was absent. Originally, board members Andy Blevins and Gary Moore voted no, but Moore changed his vote to yes in order to get the motion to pass. He explained, he had “nothing against” Luce, but he felt they were “doing wrong” by the previous varsity baseball coach.
