Interview with Katherine Rochfort Saunders

Karen Blair: Mrs. Saunders, thank you for sharing with us your reflections and memories about your teacher preparation here at Towson University, and your subsequent career. This will be an important piece of our attempt to document and highlight the evolution of teacher education across time. And I guess if we’re going to start someplace, we should start at the beginning, so would you start by sharing with us your early social context. Where you grew up, as you were going through school what you were thinking you might want to be, and when you decided possibly you might want to be a teacher, and why you chose Towson University? Kate Saunders: Sure. I’m probably a little unconventional, just in the sense that I grew up down the street. Towson was in my backyard, and I didn’t know where I wanted to go to college, but I knew I did not want to go to Towson. Ironically that’s where I went and I loved it. And I grew up with a family of teachers. My mom taught, my dad taught, my sister, her husband, two aunts, grandma, uncle--our whole family, we joke that we could have had a school. I kind of always grew up in that idea and that world, and I loved it. I played school with my stuffed animals from as early as I can remember, and I’d always help my mom with her classroom because I actually grew up down the street. She taught at Stoneleigh, and I went to Stoneleigh. It was very convenient for me to go after school and help her grade her papers. I just, I loved it, I loved being in the world of education. But then when it came time to go to college, I felt like I knew Towson already, and I didn’t want . . . like, been there, done that kind of thing. And I was completely wrong. So, I didn’t know where I wanted to go but I did not want to go to Towson, but I applied anyway just for the sake of applying. One thing led to another, and I ended up deciding to come to Towson! I’m a little different than the folks in my family in the sense that there’s a little bit more of an artistic side to the things I like to do. So I pursued Mass Comm. and Advertising. I started out with that as my major at Towson. I quickly realized that my heart was really in Elementary Education. I loved the courses that encouraged me to use my creative energy and things like that. I realized that Elementary Education requires a lot of creative energy, too. So I changed my major to Elementary Education, and again, it was one of those I needed to figure out for myself, kind of like with Towson. Do I really want to go there, or is it just because it’s right there? Well, I did really want to come here. And then with my major, I don’t want to just default to what I know and what everybody else in my family has done. I pursued that other route and realized, “Oh, my heart is really in Elementary Education, I think.” That’s, I guess, where I started and began my journey at Towson. K.B.: Did you, did you have to take, be here additional semesters? I know that Elementary Education is a very jam packed program, so I don’t know when you made that decision. K.S.: I did. It ended up being only one extra semester. K.B.: That’s not bad at all. K.S.: Not bad, especially coming from Mass Comm. I think my History Gen Ed, I took History of Rock and Roll, and so then when I came over to Elementary Ed, they were like, “Let’s do US History; you need a different History.” So I had a little bit of that to do, a little bit of catching up. Then I took a couple courses over minimester, or in the summer, just a few, and was able to only need one more semester, so I was thankful for that. K.B.: Wow, great. What do you remember about your courses in Elementary Ed? Do you think that those courses were more theoretical in nature, or were they more practical, or maybe a combination of both? K.S.: I think probably a combination of both. I mean . . . yes, a combination of both. It was a good balance, I think, of learning ideas but then putting them into practice. I don’t know, I think probably both. K.B.: And did you have any opportunity to go into schools before you got into your professional year, your internship? K.S.: We did. The professional program has level one, two, three and four, and I know in level one we started going into schools formally, more for observation. As far as going into schools before level one, I can’t say that I remember. We may have, like for a field trip. I started substitute teaching my freshman year of college, so I had been, myself, in the classrooms, just in the area on days I didn’t have class, to substitute teach and make a little extra money. So that’s kind of what I remember before the professional program, as far as classroom experience. But I don’t know that we did go in, on a regular basis at least, in class. K.B.: Okay. You had a unique kind of setup with your internship experience, so can you just sort of walk us through that, from when you started thinking about where you might want to be placed, and how you wound up where you were? K.S.: Sure. I was in Baltimore County, and the first part of my student teaching was at Grange Elementary, and I loved it. The unique thing about this for me, one of the things, is that I started in the fall. So, remember I said I had that extra semester and that’s because I didn’t end in the spring? I still had that fall semester left with my fulltime student teaching. I started in the fall when the students came back, and I loved that because I was able to get into that classroom with the classroom teacher, form that relationship with the classroom teacher, before the students were even there; and, when the students came on the first day, it was Miss Corbet and well it’s Miss Rochfort, in their classroom. I wasn’t this new person coming in, so I was really able to establish myself and my relationship with those students from day one, which I loved. Then about halfway through, I went to New Zealand to finish my student teaching, and I wouldn’t trade that for the world. I loved that, too. I was sad to leave the school, but it was fun. K.B.: So how did you make that happen? I didn’t even know we did such things. K.S.: I didn’t either, and then one of my best friends, she was in the same program with me, and she was in the same school and everything, we somehow randomly heard about it and thought, “Well maybe we should look into this.” And it took a lot of digging to figure out, “Is this possible?” Because we would bring it up, you know, you’d talk to your advisor and it’s like, “Oh, I don’t know, I’ve never heard of that.” A lot of people had not heard of it. But then I forget who it was who actually was like, “Okay, yes, we do that.” So then we were like, “Oh, this really is a possibility, this could actually happen!” You know, the thought of going to New Zealand is great--it’s the other side of the world before you start coming back around. So it’s the farthest place you could go, but then when it became a possibility, it was like, “This could be really fun.” So we had to really talk with our university supervisor and make sure that it was something that she felt comfortable with, that we felt comfortable with, and that we felt like it would be, that would stretch us and grow us as teachers, but not do a disservice to what maybe would have otherwise happen had we stayed locally. Yeah, it took a lot of digging to figure out how can we do this. K.B.: And how did you do this? I mean, did we have a relationship already with schools in New Zealand through the University or through the College of Ed? K.S.: There was a group called, was it the Junior Learning Group? It was some established group that Towson, I guess, is my hunch, partners with. And they’re over in New Zealand, and then they plug you in with the schools and they have somebody who goes around and is your university supervisor, for lack of better words, over there. So yeah, it was very organized, and we were observed by this university supervisor. While we weren’t attending Towson University, you know, a university setting over there, we still had that supervisor person who came in, observed us, and really helped us along the way. It was a very similar feel, but just in a completely different place. K.B.: Yes. So you hop on a plane, you’re on a plane for a million years, or so it seems, and you get there. How was their school setup? Was it different? I mean, you were doing an elementary experience, so are the grades the same essentially? What did you find that was different? K.S.: There was actually a lot different, and I went into the experience, and I’m not necessarily proud to say this, but I went into the experience thinking, “Oh, well they talk the same language you know, they speak the same language we do, a few minor accent details, it’s pretty much the same thing, right?” Well, no. Culturally, it’s completely different. And I think that it’s, it’s obvious when people don’t necessarily look the same as you or speak the same language as you, that there’s a cultural difference, but I was, I wasn’t really prepared for the cultural difference that I was going to face, knowing well . . . we pretty much look the same, we pretty much speak the same. It’ll be pretty much be the same, right? No, it wasn’t, and I’m grateful for that. I learned a ton. And I think some of the biggest differences . . . I mean just physically the school buildings are different. They don’t have, for the most part or at least what I saw, one big school building with three levels and a cafeteria inside. It’s not like that. They had one main room, where it was kind of like a gymnasium, but it’s detached, it’s by itself. The classrooms were all detached. There was no hallway, the hallway was outside. The kids ate lunch outside, and each classroom had kind of, it was a permanent awning, like covering, where so if it was raining, you just scooch under there and that’s where you ate. You know, it wasn’t because they couldn’t afford a cafeteria; that’s just what they do. That’s just what they do. It was funny, at first, when I would line them up to go places, like walk down the hall, it’s like well, we’re just walking to the library, which is outside. You know, it was just kind of awkward. Because I’m like, do I need to make them not talk? Because, you know, in school here, you don’t want to disrupt the other classrooms. Out there, it was funny. I actually remember this one time, this little boy jumped out of line, and he was climbing up a lamppost. And it was like, only in New Zealand would somebody cut out of line to climb up a lamppost. That was a big difference. Another big difference was that a lot of times don’t wear shoes. Which is fine, and in fact, and I have a picture of this, I should try to find this, in the library, because it’s carpeted, there was a sign outside the door that said please remove your shoes before you come into the library. So they had this little mat where everybody, including myself, we’d have to take off our shoes, set them right outside. I had a field trip one time with them, and we were walking, and it was a decent walk. We walked to this outdoor museum, and I had to remind them, please bring shoes to school tomorrow because we’re going on, a half, three-quarters of a mile walk, and you need your walking shoes. That was funny. But again, it wasn’t a sign of poverty; it just was a cultural thing. They’re very laid back, and I think that that kind of is the underlying theme through all of this, of well, “I might just cut out of line and jump up a lamppost, because I’m active and I like to be active.” or “I might just decide to take my shoes off because I can and it’s comfortable to me.” It’s not so rigid. They stop at ten o’clock every day for tea, and I thought it was kind of a joke at first, but it’s real. We were on a bus one day, too, and this was when we weren’t even in school. It’s a cultural thing. The bus pulled over. Ten o’clock, we have tea. It’s just what you do. So all the students would go outside, and there would be one teacher assigned to watch every student in the school outside while they played, while everybody else was inside having tea and cookies, things like that. That was different. It was really cool, though, because it really promoted the camaraderie between folks who worked in the school, so I thought that was neat. K.B.: Very nice. Do they start school about the same time? Do they have a kindergarten program, or an infant program or something like that? K.S.: I think so. I mean, the school where I was, it was a primary school, which is like elementary school, so they didn’t there. But they have those kinds of centers and daycares and things like that, and then they come to all-day school, which is like our elementary school. My classroom, in particular, and I don’t know that they do this in every classroom, but the classroom where I was, was kind of like a split level of grades. I had third and fourth grade. It was interesting that they, I’ve heard of that a little bit here every now in then in the states, and I don’t know that that was something that they always do in New Zealand, but the classroom that I was in was split. So there were a couple different ages and third or fourth grade; sometimes there can be a decent difference, you know, just maturity and everything. That was actually pretty cool. I learned a lot from that, from having that challenge. So yeah, I don’t know if that answers your question. K.B.: It does. How about curriculum? Do you remember anything about what the kids were learning? Do they have to take state or national tests? Do they have, you know, MSA [Maryland School Assessment] paranoia in the spring? K.S.: You know, not that I know of. I’m pretty sure that they do not, because I probably would have felt that pressure to make sure that I was teaching the right formats and things like that. And I didn’t feel that way, and I’m pretty sure that they do not. Now, that may have changed now, I haven’t kept up with what’s going on in their education, but to my knowledge they didn’t have MSA or any kind of state- or, not state, but you know, nationwide tests that they had to mark and be at a certain place by a certain time. It was, which I think is probably why my classroom was the way it was when I was there, because there were so many different people in so many different places of their concepts of understanding. My favorite subject is math, and so I remember specifically in math, people, I had some group of students who were ready to add, you know, decimals. Some people were still learning what does a decimal mean, what is a decimal point, what does it do? And that’s a big difference. I think, had there been some sort of tests, I wouldn’t have seen such a big difference. I don’t know. I liked that, I liked having the little pockets. A couple people were here, some people were here, so we kind of were all learning about the same concept but we were all in different places. So we had to really juggle where everybody was so everybody was challenged, but they were understanding and could create an understanding of the next step. And it wasn’t like, “I don’t even know what a decimal is! What do you mean add a decimal?” It was cool. K.B.: Yeah. So was that your last semester at Towson? K.S.: Yes. K.B.: So you finished at the end of a fall semester. K.S.: I did, yep. K.B.: So here you are, you’ve had this fabulous experience in New Zealand, but you’re out there, not back here looking for potential jobs in education. And at the same time, you have had experience, because you’ve done some substitute teaching, I guess in a variety of grade levels? K.S.: Right, elementary through high school, yeah. K.B.: But at the same time, you are also working in a different kind of job. Tell us a little bit about that. K.S.: So it was the job that I had through . . . I started in high school, it was with a company called South Moon Under, and it was a retail job. Loved it, and since I decided to come to Towson, I went ahead and stayed and worked there through college as well. At the end of college, when I came back from New Zealand, it was right before I got married. My then fiancé and I were talking, and the next step was for me to . . . All right, I came back from New Zealand; it’s time to go interview for teaching jobs. You know, that’s what I thought I wanted to do. So I did, I remember specifically one morning I had my interview with Baltimore County and then I went into work afterwards in my interview clothes and had to put my jeans on. I think it was at that moment that it was kind of like, “I’m not going to be here at South Moon.” And they knew that I was pursuing teaching, and had said to me, they basically made me an offer that I felt like I couldn’t say no to. Again, my fiancé and I talked about it, and it was like, well if I’m going to take a management job in retail, if I’m ever going to do that, now is the time to do it. We don’t have kids, and I love working there. We went ahead and decided that’ll be the best thing for us right now, that’ll be great. I have my teaching degree and no one can take that away from me, and I love it still. I’ve kept up my certification, so that was important, just to make sure because I never want to shut that door, you know. So I went ahead and stayed with South Moon. I came on board as a manager and loved it. I mean, I think, total, I was there for ten and a half years, so it really was also a part of who I was. K.B.: Sure. K.S.: And again, the creative energy, I loved it. But there were a lot of things that I did learn at Towson through my Elementary Ed program, that weren’t, you’d think . . . Well, how in the world can you relate management and Elementary Education? K.B.: How can you relate them? K.S.: Well, it was interesting, because part of my job as a manager at South Moon Under was to train our staff, and it was training new people who came in and didn’t maybe know a thing about the company or what we were about or anything. So training them, but then also providing ongoing training for folks who have been there for a while. And so, really, the concept of learning and constructing meaning of things, it doesn’t matter, if you’re in elementary school or if you’re out in the working world, whatever, there’s a lot of the same basic principles that I learned here at Towson that were very applicable to my job as a manager at South Moon Under. So it’s kind of funny, you wouldn’t necessarily think, but it definitely was helpful in using that teacher toolbox, so to speak, to train folks. K.B.: Right, absolutely. But you did leave. K.S.: I did, I did. K.B.: And why that change? K.S.: Like I said, I’d been there about ten and a half years, and I think I was just ready for something new and something different. As you can imagine, teaching is the same way. You are “on,” you have to be “on,” is what I call it. It’s the best way to describe it, you have to be “on.” You are in front of people all day long, just going, going, going, going. And I think after ten and a half years, I was kind of ready for a shift, something a little different. And I wanted to come into the education world; I was really missing it. And I actually, it was funny, I noticed when our customers would come in, I got to know their kids really well too, because I just, you know, I gravitate and have a passion for that. So that was always pretty funny. So I was ready for a change, I wanted to get back into the education world, but I didn’t want to have to be “on.” To be a classroom teacher, you’ve got to be “on,” you know, firing on all cylinders at all times. I knew I didn’t, I wasn’t ready for that right now. I needed a little bit of a break. And when I saw that the Elementary Education Department had an administrative assistant position, I thought, “Oh my gosh, that could be perfect!” So that was that, and then, here I am. K.B.: Well, and you also had a connection with Towson. I mean, you had been here, and I think an affection for Towson. K.S.: Oh, hands down, absolutely. I mean, to me, Towson’s like home. I say this to anybody who is thinking about Towson but is like how I was. Well, I grew up here and I don’t want . . . It is so different when you are a student here, it is so different from what you ever think you knew. And your parents aren’t just going to show up on campus, that was, I think, my fear, like, “Oh well, if I go to Towson, my family is just going to show up.” That’s just not what happens. I really, I know this campus in a completely different way now. You know, I used to maybe come sledding when I was little, but it’s different. Very much appreciate the fact, too, that I went through this program and so I know what our students are going through. And when they come into the office and they’re panicking because they’re missing this on their level one application, I can identify with that because I was there and I had to hand in a level one application too, and it’s going to be okay. So I think it kind of gives me that ability to relate with them in a way that maybe, had I obviously not gone to Towson, I wouldn’t know what they were experiencing. K.B.: Right, or if you hadn’t majored in Elementary Ed. K.S.: Exactly, right. So I think that that’s pretty cool, because it gives us a little bit of a . . . They appreciate the fact that I know what they’re going through, and I’m not just like, well I don’t know what you’re talking about. I appreciate the fact that they work really hard to hand in their application. K.B.: And also provide you with an opportunity to be a little bit creative. K.S.: Yes, very much. K.B.: And if somebody were to walk past your office door or look at the bulletin boards you’re responsible for, so that’s kind of . . . K.S.: Yeah, I do love doing the bulletin boards! That’s my little creative outlet, for sure. K.B.: I mean, that’s part of being an elementary teacher, is being responsible for all that stuff. So there’s a smidgen of that, or more than a smidgen in what you’re doing as well. So you think that you are using a lot of your Elementary Ed in your current position? K.S.: I do. I think again, having gone through it, I’m just on the other side of things now. And I’m not necessarily in a teacher role by any means, but I think there were a lot of things that anybody can learn and apply to a lot of things that they do, whether it’s Elementary Education or not. I do think probably one day that I would love to go and be a classroom teacher. I don’t know when. Who knows? But I definitely have every intention of keeping up my certification and keeping the door open for when it’s right. You know, you just have to, to me, figure out what’s right for you and your family and your situation, the timing and things like that. K.B.: Well and so you probably will have an opportunity, probably sooner than later, to start being an instructional individual, so this is going to be something in your near future, since you’re introducing a new member of your family at the end of the year. K.S.: Right, yeah, in just a few weeks. K.B.: So that will certainly put you in a position to use some of those skills. K.S.: Right, yes. K.B.: Is there anything that we have missed about your Towson experience, or your personal professional journey that you would want to add? K.S.: I mean, I think the only thing I’d want to add on top of that is that the instructors that I had were absolutely amazing, and left incredible impressions (I guess is the best word) on me that can never be taken away. There are a couple people in particular, but really all of them. K.B.: You can mention people, you’re allowed to do that. K.S.: Okay. Barbara Ann Ellis was my university supervisor, and she was awesome. She had very high expectations of the group of us and pushed us really hard, and I learned so much from being under her supervision. Just really came to have a great friendship with her too, in a professional way, but it just was, she really cared about our wellbeing in becoming the best teachers that we could be, and that was really cool. You know, that kind of a thing too, the way that she supervised us, those are life lessons that you learn and can apply. I remember being a manager and thinking, how can I foster the growth of the people that I’m training? Kind of like Barbara Ann did, what was it about what she did that made it really special and unique? That’s not necessarily applying Elementary Education concepts, but it’s taking something that I learned here at Towson and really applying that. So I think the instructors hands down, I remember Nancy Shelton, I had her for Children’s Literature, and I just became enthralled with children’s literature after that class! I was buying all of the books to keep them in my own library, just to have, because I really developed a great passion for them. And I think it takes a special kind of teacher to really spark that in somebody. So the instructors, that would be my one thing. K.B.: Okay. What would you say to individuals who . . . given the fact that you have so many teachers in your extended family, what would you say to someone who was considering teaching as a career? Now you’re somebody who trained to become a teacher and are not practicing teaching in a formal setting, as an elementary teacher. But what would you say, do you think, what words of advice would you give, given your own path? K.S.: I think one thing would be that while you are a teacher, you are also very much learning in that process, and can learn a ton from not just the other teachers, but the students in your classroom. Be prepared to both teach and learn. And that, you know, I don’t know, there’s this idea out there that, “Oh, if I’m an elementary school teacher, I just get to do the pretty bulletin boards, and I leave at 3:30, and I have summers off.” That’s just not the reality. And I know I have not had my own classroom, but again coming from a family of teachers, I see the hard work that goes into it. I see the nights that you’re pouring over different papers and different preparation materials. It takes a lot. I think people really have to ask themselves and evaluate where they are at that time they’re making that decision, “Do I really, can I give 110% of myself right now to this?” Because that’s what it’s going to take. At the end of the day, you know, it’s not about how pretty your bulletin boards look or how quickly you can leave school. It’s, “Did the students construct the understanding that they needed,” and to really have a passion for that a-ha moment when you see a student really get something for the first time. It’s awesome. To let that be what drives you to want to be a teacher, and not just think, “Oh well, I would have off in the summers.” Because they earn every day that they have off in the summer, trust me, it’s in the book somewhere else during the school year. I think that, that gets me mad when people say that. K.B.: Me too. Okay, anything else? K.S.: I think that’s it. K.B.: Great!