Briana FlorezAssistant dean and associate professor of the School of Education Ann Monroe is this year’s recipient of the Elsie M. Hood Outstanding Teacher Award.
Monroe was given the award during UM’s Honors Convocation on April 5. This award is given each year to one faculty member who goes above and beyond for his or her students and embodies the highest quality of teaching. Each year, the winner receives $5,000 and a personal plaque and has his or her name engraved on a permanent plaque in the chancellor’s office.
Monroe first started teaching in 1997 at Thrasher Elementary School in Signal Mountain, Tennessee. She began her career as a third-grade teacher and, according to her students, often shares stories about that period of her life.
What Monroe enjoys most about her job is teaching undergraduate students because she believes this enables her to make the biggest impact on K-12 classrooms. She said teaching young, pre-service teachers gives her the chance to make a positive impact on these students before they begin their teaching careers.
“I want them to think about the influence a teacher has and how to use that influence for good,” Monroe said. “I want them to realize every child that graces their classroom door is important, brings something of value with them and is capable of learning and growing.”
Her original plan was to earn a master’s degree and return back to her roots as an elementary school teacher. However, when her husband was given a fellowship to study the literature of William Faulkner at Ole Miss, Monroe went back to school full-time and earned a graduate degree. After teaching in the School of Education during her time as a graduate student, she became aware that she wanted to teach college students.
“It was the experience I had teaching in the School of Education as a graduate student that led me to know that college-level teaching was something I wanted to do,” Monroe said. “I enjoyed sharing my experiences teaching elementary school with future teachers and began to realize the impact I could have on children by helping future teachers.”
Senior secondary English education major Gabrielle Vogt, one of several students who nominated Monroe for this award, was a student in Monroe’s EDCI 353 class.
Vogt said the class is vital for showing education majors how to create lesson plans and begin their observations of real classroom settings. Vogt said there is nothing typical about the way Monroe runs her classroom and that she puts on a performance during each lecture that is worthy of a standing ovation
“In her nomination letter, I described sitting in her class as watching a Broadway performance, because to Dr. Monroe, the classroom is her stage. Despite her class being at 8 a.m., Dr. Monroe kept everyone awake with her stories about being a third-grade teacher,” Vogt said. “There were many classes when I left in tears from laughing so hard.”
Although Monroe’s teaching style is fun-spirited and engaging, Vogt said Monroe still holds all of her students to high expectations.
“Dr. Monroe is not an ‘easy’ professor. She has high expectations, and you have to put in the work,” Vogt said. “However, the reward is getting to spend a few hours in her classroom. Dr. Monroe truly gives her all, every class.”
Vogt said there is no one more deserving of this honor.
“She left her third-grade classroom with a goal of inspiring future teachers to go out and inspire their own students,” Vogt said. “Dr. Monroe has done just that with thousands of education majors here at Ole Miss. She has made a remarkable difference in the lives of so many.”
According to an Ole Miss news release, during the award presentation Chancellor Jeffrey Vitter said that what is most impressive about Monroe is how she has helped her students see the worth of “paying it forward” as a teacher by emphasizing the importance of teaching in the classroom and interacting with students.
