Angel Olinger Selected Teacher of the Year for Clinton School District

CLINTON — Angel Olinger gives her algebra students every chance to succeed.
“She can be found tutoring her students before or after school and many days during her lunch break,” said Dr. Eddie Peasant, Clinton High School principal. “As a result of her assiduous effort this past year, 10th grade Algebra I scores on the 2009 Subject Area Test were the highest ever for Clinton High School.”
Her work has not gone unnoticed; her peers recently elected her Teacher of the Year at CHS, and an independent panel this week chose her as the Clinton Public School District Teacher of the Year.
She was honored in a surprise presentation on Friday.
“Ms. Olinger does a fantastic job educating children, and I’m certain she will represent us well in the state competition,” said Dr. Phil Burchfield, superintendent.
Olinger received a BS in Education from Mississippi State University and is certified to teach English and math. She began her teaching career in 1995, teaching eighth-grade English at Columbus Middle School. She has taught at Hazlehurst High School, Copiah County Alternative School, Copiah Academy and Byram Middle School.
She came to Clinton High School in 2007, and currently teaches Algebra I, Algebra II and Geometry.
“When I became a teacher, I knew that my job was to ensure that the students who entered my room left it with more than just knowledge,” she said. “They had to leave with the ability to understand, decipher and apply that knowledge.”
Peasant also praised Olinger also for her classroom management skills. Olinger said she believes the teacher should be up and around, all the time.
“I stay in front of the classroom when I teach, and when my students are doing individual work, I’m up and walking around them,” she said.
And all classes, she said, should be taught on an honors level, where students have the opportunity to develop their higher order thinking skills.
“That will not come by memorization and rote practice,” she said. “Students need to learn how to apply the information they are receiving. … I try to approach all classes as though I were teaching an advanced placement class.
“A teacher’s expectations are a powerful tool in the classroom.”
Olinger is no stranger to Teacher of the Year honors. She was named Teacher of the Year for three consecutive years at Byram Middle School, and was the 2001-02 Hinds County Teacher of the Year.
As Clinton Public School District’s Teacher of the Year, she will represent Clinton in the state Teacher of the Year competition this spring, held by the Mississippi Department of Education.
“My educational philosophy hasn’t changed in 15 years but the methods that I use to work toward achieving that philosophy are always changing,” she said. “I know that the mark of a true educator is that as a teacher, I can never stop improving and learning. And in the future, I hope I never will.”

Here are the results from a student poll: