Shawna Byrd Elementary Teacher of the Year
Launch the media gallery 1 playerSpeech therapist Shawna Byrd was selected by her fellow faculty members as Teacher of the Year for Geary Elementary School. Mrs. Byrd has worked in education for 13 years, with nine of those years at Geary Elementary Mrs. Byrd earned a special education degree from SWOSU and Master's degree at UCO in speech pathology. She is enthusiastic about helping her students with their language and communication issues. She remarked, "I love the excitement of helping a student be able to produce a sound for the first time, or learn a new language skill. I love celebrating their successes and thinking of new ways to make speech therapy fun."
When not meeting face-to-face, she visits with her students virtually. "Although scheduling and finding ways to learn skills have been challenging with remote learning, I also feel that there have been some positive effects. I love being able to have a conversation with my students and see how their speech and language skills are generalizing into their home setting. I have many students who are learning personal responsibility such as logging themselves in at their scheduled time, as well as developing computer skills that they wouldn’t have otherwise learned. Remote learning has made all of us frustrated. My students are learning how to not give up when something is hard. These are all great life lessons. I am so proud of them!" Mrs. Byrd said she would like to thank the Geary Faculty and her students' parents for their support and for making her feel welcome.
Mrs. Byrd and her husband, Jason, have a 14-year-old daughter, Dayona. Their family also includes three dogs and three cats. Her hobbies include rescuing dogs, singing, traveling, shopping, hiking, and spending time with family.
