Spotlight 4 Success
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Spotlight 4 Success
When History Meets Policy: One Teacher's Mission to Support Educators
The conversation reveals how Simmons rose from an interested elementary social studies teacher to becoming the president who oversaw Tennessee's hosting of the National Council for Social Studies conference in Nashville—what she calls "one of the highlights of my career." With her background in event planning, she successfully showcased Tennessee's rich historical landscape from Civil War to Civil Rights history to educators from across the nation.
Spotlight 4 Success: Spotlight 4 Success
Welcome to Spotlight for Success by American Book Company. I'm Devin Pintosa, your host. We are here in Gatlinburg, tennessee, at the Tennessee Council of Social Studies, and we are so excited to be here with Laura Simmons, the president of the Tennessee Council of Social Studies. Welcome, laura. Thank you so of the Tennessee Council of Social Studies. Welcome, laura.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 1:Thank you. So tell us a bit about your experience. You've been president. Now is it three years.
Speaker 2:Yes, that's correct. So, normally we run two-year terms and we were fortunate enough to host NCSS, our National Council's conference, last year in Nashville, so I ended up with an extended year.
Speaker 1:Wow, that's wonderful, and I understand you are also teaching simultaneously, right?
Speaker 2:Absolutely. I teach eighth grade early US history.
Speaker 1:Wow, and you're at a community middle school, is that right?
Speaker 2:Yes, I'm in Middle Tennessee, south of Nashville.
Speaker 1:Wonderful. And so how does that work? I would just like juggling. Okay, I am an eighth grade social studies teacher. I'm also running the TCSS. How does that happen?
Speaker 2:Well, I'm extremely fortunate to have a huge backing our other council members, our other board members. We have been a council for over 70 years.
Speaker 1:Oh, wow.
Speaker 2:And we have worked this into a well-oiled machine. So I have a lot of support and I was originally an elementary social studies teacher okay and so I did a couple of conferences, attended a couple of conferences myself and was interested in getting more involved with the board, and I approached the current president and asked how to get more involved and she invited me to a meeting and a few years later asked me if I was interested in serving in a position and asked me if I wanted to become our president-elect.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:Which put me in place to be the president when we hosted NCSS in Nashville last year.
Speaker 1:That's amazing. So I understand your career is extraordinary because it's usually a two-year term, correct?
Speaker 2:Yes, correct, we were trying to figure out how to navigate that without having our own state conference last year. So everybody thought this was kind of the easiest way to go was just to extend a year until we got here to.
Speaker 1:Gatlinburg there we go, that's right. Can you tell us a little bit about what that experience was like, hosting the NCSS last year?
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Speaker 2:That was one of the highlights, probably, of my career. I have a little bit of an event planning background anyway, so that kind of fell right in with what I'm used to doing social studies educators from all over the country to downtown Nashville to experience all of our history and what Nashville has to offer, from Civil War history to Civil Rights history. It was an incredible experience to have everybody here in our backyard.
Speaker 1:That is wonderful, and can you tell me a bit about what you see in the future for TCSS? What are some of the needs of the education community and how is TCSS going to help serve them?
Speaker 2:There is not an educator out there today that isn't feeling the pressure of what it's like to be in the classroom, the pressure of what it's like to be in the classroom. And we, especially here in Tennessee, are dealing with all kinds of issues with what we know we are allowed to teach and maybe what we aren't sure whether or not we are allowed to teach. Sure, whether or not we are allowed to teach.
Speaker 2:We have our divisive concepts prohibited topics that the legislators have decided that we don't need to teach, and so helping educators navigate those waters and having resources available, working with the National Council and seeing what other states are doing to support their educators and relaying that information back to our teachers and being here helping them try to get reliable resources and things they can use in the classroom with their kids.
Speaker 1:Yes, I can understand that can create some new challenges in the classroom Absolutely, but it's wonderful that TCSS is there to step in and that you've been able to help with that process, including whatever the needs are. I know there's a lot of things. Our last guest spoke about AI coming in the classroom and that's created a new wave of things as well.
Speaker 2:Always new challenges.
Speaker 1:Yes, there's so much going on Alright, great. Is there anything you'd like to share with the TCSS community today?
Speaker 2:We are all in the same boat. So if we can ever do anything as a council, as board, to support you in the classroom, please reach out to us and let us know and we are always welcoming educators to get more involved with our group and we want to hear from you. So please let us know what we can do to support you better that's wonderful, uh.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much, laura simmons. Tennessee. Council of social studies president, thank you so much for coming on board with us today thank you so much for having me.