District teacher is awarded K-8 german educator of the year

German teacher of Westside Middle School, Ginger Starks-Yoble, has been in the district for ten years teaching what she loves. Little did she know she’d become the 2017 K-8 German Educator of the year. Starks-Yoble views the award as a recognition for how far she’s come as a German teacher.

Before she was a German teacher, she didn’t originally want to become a teacher. She said she had always wanted to travel abroad but knew the only way to do that was with a second language. She decided to major in German after studying the language in high school. During one of her four years of college she spent a semester in Germany and fell in love with the culture and language.

Starks-Yoble applied for a Fulbright Scholarship and received the scholarship which allowed her to live in Germany for a whole year. She worked part time as a teacher in a German school teaching English to kids. It was her first experience as a teacher and she fell in love with it. After returning from Germany, Starks-Yoble attended graduate school and received two master’s degrees. After graduating in the spring of 2007, she began her teaching at Westside Middle School.

“It’s very humbling, the sheer recognition of my peers, former students, and parents and the time they put into writing letters of recommendation for me,” Starks-Yoble said. “It’s a big honor but it’s also kind of hard to wrap my mind around. I’m so focused on the here and the now and what’s going on here, that this national recognition doesn’t come up on my radar because I just wasn’t looking for it.”

The award, given by the American Association Teachers of German, includes getting to attend a national level conference in Nashville, and a big ceremony awarding her for her accomplishments and achievements. She will hold the title for a year and also attend a local and state level conference in the near future.

Starks-Yoble says the relationships she forms with her students and knowing that she has the chance to help people become better at speaking German is what motivates her every day.

“I want to come to school every day because I enjoy what I do,” Starks-Yoble said.

As for the future, Starks-Yoble hopes to continue to teach German. She wants to be flexible to change and possibility, but hasn’t thought about what it would look like outside the walls of her classroom.

“I don’t want to teach so long that I would become unhappy or start to see it in the faces of my students,” Starks-Yoble said. “When the students aren’t able to relate to me or identify with me, it might be a sign I’m outgrowing my classroom.”

With her Ph.D., she’s qualified to teach at a higher level, above high school. But for now at least, Starkes-Yoble thinks she relates well with her current students.