FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE N.R. #146, 3/24/00
Date: March 24, 2000
Contact: Irene Cromer
(703)791-8720
Judith Nossaman Is County Teacher Of The Year
Judith Nossaman, a former Peace Corps volunteer who is now a fourth grade teacher at Mountain View Elementary School in Haymarket, has been named the Prince William County Teacher of the Year and the recipient of the Washington Post Agnes Meyer Outstanding Teacher Award. Ms. Nossaman will represent Prince William in the Region IV competition for the Virginia Teacher of the Year Award. Region IV includes 20 county and city school systems.
For more than six years Nossaman and Phillip Wells, a special education teacher, have worked together teaching at Mountain View Elementary School. Some of their students have been tested as exceptionally gifted and talented, while others struggle with learning disabilities such as bi-polar disorder, ADD, ADHD, emotional disturbance, and autism. This "least restrictive environment" can only work if the classroom teacher is "committed to the success of each student, applying determination, willingness, capability, knowledge, and a wonderful sense of humor, all of which characterize Ms. Nossaman," said Wells.
A former Peace Corps volunteer who had taught mathematics in the Philippines and trained Peace Corps volunteers for the Philippines Program I Hawaii, Nossaman had earlier taught kindergarten and third grade at schools in Illinois and Kansas, respectively. After her Peace Corps service and a ten-year hiatus, she spent several years as assistant director of a daycare center in Fairfax County and created and implemented a kindergarten program at a day care center in Manassas. She acquired her Virginia certification in 1981 and joined the Prince William County school division that year.
Nossaman has, at various times, taught first and third grade at Bel Air, Lake Ridge, and Marshall elementary schools. For five years she served as a gifted resource teacher in seven elementary schools, and in 1988, she was recognized as "Outstanding Teacher of the Gifted." Nossaman, who earned certification in gifted education in 1989, received her M.A. in research in curriculum and instruction from George Mason University in 1995. Since 1995, she has been a fourth/fifth grade inclusion teacher at Mountain View, where she loops with the fourth graders through the fifth grade. Nossaman was previously nominated for the Agnes Meyer award in 1991.
Nossaman was selected from among 19 teachers nominated by their school communities for this honor. The finalists were Walter Bailey, Hylton High School; and Mary Haley, Rockledge Elementary School. The Washington Post Educational Foundation will recognize Nossaman and other Agnes Meyer Award winners from nineteen school systems in the metropolitan region at a reception on Monday, April 10.
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