Barbara T.

Barbara is a bilingual level III teacher with several endorsements, including Technology Education, Information Technology Coordinator, Computer Science, Mathematics, Social Studies, and Business Education. She studied in both Poland and the U.S., and constantly educate herself and participate in a variety of professional development opportunities. This way, she brings the most updated, practical, and useful knowledge to her disadvantaged and underrepresented students from Title 1 school. As a certified Microsoft Office Specialist and Adobe Certified Associate, she started with teaching Computer Applications and Web Design. Few years later, in collaboration with SFCC, she started teaching Web Design using HTML (HyperText Markup Language) and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) for dual credit. Next, in collaboration with UNM, she added another dual-credit Intro to Computer Science course with NetLogo (agent based programming language). But, the more professional guest speakers she listened to, the more interested in Python she became. And that is why Barbara currently implements Amazon Future Engineers program with its Intro to Computer Science with Python as the starting course in their pathway. She also passed another industry certification exam: Intro to Programming using Python and became officially certified as Microsoft Technology Associate. In addition to this certificate Barbara also took and successfully passed Python Programmer exam at Python Institute as well as TestOut Linux Pro. In addition to teaching various CS courses, she also engages her students in extracurricular activities, incl. participation in a variety of competitions, preparation for industry certification exams, mentorship, and even internship opportunities. Several of her former students study CS at various universities, one of which won 3rd place in the 2018 Congressional App Challenge, as well as led the Supercomputing Challenge team that became the finalist and received the Award for Research from NM Technology in Education in 2020. Her other teams won 1st place in 2020, 2nd place in 2021, and 3rd place in the 2022 Congressional App Challenge (for NM district 3) as well as won in 2020, 2021, and 2022 Governor's STEM Challenge and received an honorable mention in 2021 & 2022 Climate Innovation Challenge. Another Barbara's teams won the Cybersecurity Award in 2021 Supercomputing Challenge as well as became first-level finalists and recipients of the Award for Exploration from the same challenge in 2022. Also, every year her senior students, who participate in the Supercomputing Challenge earn scholarships to the universities of their choice. Based on all she has done so far in order to bring CS to her school, Barbara was recognized and awarded by several institutions/organizations, including: - Rising Stars in the Southwest & former Santa Fe Mayor, Javier Gonzales ("In Honor of Service" Diploma awarded in September 2016); - NM Governor (recognition for winning in 2020 & 2022 Governor's STEM Challenge); - NCWIT Aspirations in Computing (2021 & 2022 Educator Award); - NCWIT Aspirations in Computing (2023 Affiliate Educator Honorable Mention); - Supercomputing Challenge (2021 & 2022 Teacher Appreciation Award); - Santa Fe Partners in Education (2021 Teacher Who Inspires Award); - CSTA (2021 Teaching Excellence Award); - Climate Innovation Challenge (Honorable Mention in 2021 & 2022); - NM School Boards Association (2022 Excellence in Student Achievement Award)