Crawford Woods Elementary teacher Sue Ernst says she always felt like she wanted to be an educator, even as a child.
“I remember playing ‘school’ when I was young. I would set up my classroom and teach my stuffed animals and younger brother (my older brother wouldn’t stand for it),” she said. “I had many teachers who made a positive impact on me and dreamed of doing the same for students of my own one day. I declared elementary education as my major as soon as I started college.”
Ernst has been in some teaching capacity for the past 18 years, having started in the Southwest Local School District, subbed in Oak Hills, tutored in the Cincinnati Public district, and eventually she joined the Hamilton City Schools.
Ernst has taught the fourth, fifth and sixth grades at Crawford Woods for six years.
She and her husband have two grown children — a son who works in Colorado and a daughter studying nursing in Cincinnati.
Ernst’s passion for teaching is the desire for students to understand their education is “their ticket to life.”
“They are all capable of learning and growing,” she said. “We all have strengths and weaknesses, but it is in the commitment to work that they will reach their goals. I hope they know that they are cared about and the reason I challenge them is because that’s where the growth happens. If it’s easy, they aren’t growing.”
She says the students have helped her grow, too.
“I keep sharpening my strategies and approaches because each student comes with their own unique needs and I want to meet them.”
Ernst is working to earn a Master’s degree in administration and hopes to lean on her teaching experience, love for children and desire to positively impact educators and family for succession in education. She is wanting to become an assistant principal, ideally in Hamilton.
“Wherever my career takes me, I want to make sure that my students know they are cared about first and they can accomplish great things if they set goals and are willing to do the hard work to achieve them. I want to support students in their growth and help them to realize a little step in that direction is what gets them to the end goal, it won’t happen overnight.”