I graduated from the University of North Dakota with a BS in Elementary Education and the University of Northern Colorado with a MS in Educational Media. I have been teaching at Washington/Traut Core Knowledge School since 1995. My husband, Bruce, and I have been in Fort Collins since 1990 and have raised two daughters, both graduates of Traut. We chose Traut because of the 5 pillars and have been extremely pleased with their education in PSD.
Both of our daughters are married and living on the East coast now. We also added a grandson to the family in 2021. He is a very special young person and as a toddler, he loves books, both being read to and pretending to read to himself.
I work with the most amazing staff and parent partners in the district. The five pillars are fundamental in our school and I appreciate all of them, especially our parent partnership and character education pillars.
Reading, hiking, crocheting and traveling are my favorite hobbies. One of my goals is to visit all 50 states and I have about 6 to go. We have traveled to India, China, Taiwan, Istanbul, Iceland, and Scotland in the past few years. This past summer we traveled quite a bit around the USA by car, visiting Washington state, Oregon, Kentucky, Iowa, Minnesota, North Dakota, Idaho and Utah.
Walk Two Moons by Sharon Creech is my all-time favorite book. Other authors I love are Scott O'Dell, Avi, Jan Brett, Judy Blume... the list is endless. I also love to read Newbery Award winners.
My favorite genre is historical fiction, followed by realistic fiction. I love watching movies that were inspired by books and comparing them. I find that the books are much better about 95% of the time. It is fun to see how a book is interpreted by the filmmaker.
Worrying does not empty tomorrow of its troubles -- it empties today of its strength. --Corrie Ten Boom
In the library, I have the pleasure of seeing all the students at Traut for 45 minutes each week. Frequently, we divide the primary students into two groups and they spend half the period in the library and half in the computer lab. The upper grade students work both in the library and lab as needed.