About Me

Hello all!

So, I want to share some things that might help you have a better understanding of who I am and how I have become the "me" you all know me to be. I have a husband, Jerome, and twins, Ian and Rylee at home. Jerome works from home in technical support for Verizon Wireless. Ian and Rylee are 20, and they are making great plans for the future. Ian is currently studying Music Education at Winthrop University and Rylee is in Medical Studies at Tri-County Technical College. We also have three pets: 2 cats (Lily and Tux), and 1 dog (Otis). They keep our life exciting!!

My family and I have lived in Easley for 17 years, and we love our community! My favorite things to do in my spare time are to hang out with my family and friends, play music (mostly piano these days), create meal plans/shopping lists/prep lists, and COOK!!

I am originally from Florence, SC (think much closer to the beach). I was an athlete, playing softball throughout my childhood, and I almost went to college on scholarship as a pitcher. I was also a musician, taking piano lessons from the age of five, and joining band and playing the clarinet in elementary school. I played piano in my middle and high school jazz ensembles, and loved that as well. After high school, I went to Clemson University on scholarship for performance, and played in Tiger Band.

I have been teaching special education for 24 years, and I have been at West Greenville for 17 of those, and Hughes Academy for 7 before that. I first realized that I wanted to be a teacher when I was in high school, but I thought that I wanted to teach music and band, because at the time, that was my greatest passion. I had made the plan to attend UofSC and knew that I had it all figured out. All of this changed because of one amazing educator. I took Teacher Cadets my senior year in high school, which is a class for people that know or think that they want to become teachers. As a requirement for this class, you must have a classroom practicum/teaching experience. One day before this started, my teacher pulled myself and two other students aside and told us that she "saw something special" in the three of us, and asked if we would be willing to try something new. She was one of our school's special education teachers, and she must have known what to look for, because today the three of us all teach in the special education/remediation field. I cannot thank her more for giving me the opportunity to discover what I was actually meant to do!!

Being a self-contained teacher, I have taught all subject areas. My career started out teaching a Wilson based reading method to students with significant reading disabilities. After this, I moved into teaching students who were diagnosed with emotional disabilities in a self-contained and multi-categorical environment. When I initially came to West Greenville, I taught in the IAES classroom, but soon moved over into teaching students that were diagnosed with intellectual disabilities. Today, my colleagues and I have divided up the academic core classes and my area is math. I also teach music club because of my background and passion for music education, and my Food Preparation & Service class came out of my personal love for the culinary arts. I enjoy teaching all subject areas, but teaching Food Preparation/Service in addition to ELA is where I currently find the greatest rewards.

I love our school and everything that we have the opportunity to provide to our students. Dr. O'Laughlin allows and encourages us to not only provide instruction, but she also places an emphasis on "connections" with our students that make them want to grow and succeed. The pride that I have seen them develop in themselves through the "extra-curriculars" that we provide is why I find the greatest joy in those classes. I love helping the students increase their skills in mathematics, and I work hard to teach concepts like fractions, money transactions, and linear equations. But the joys come from music students with no musical background being able to describe the pros and cons of a new music genre, or being able to tell me what "syncopation" means. It also comes when Food Prep laughs together about the reality of what a shrimp de-veining knife is actually helping you remove, when a student asks you every day if we're going to cook something, or when another realizes that becoming a chef is their new life's goal. West Greenville is definitely a special place where amazing things are happening everyday, and I am blessed to be here...

Mrs. Jackson