Teacher of the Year Honorable Mention: Megan Deal, Learning

This is the fourth and final in a series of posts celebrating the accomplishments of our four 2024 Participate Learning Teacher of the Year Honorable Mentions.

The 2024 Participate Learning Teacher of the Year awards recognize teachers in the Participate Learning Network who have shown an exceptional commitment to their students and school community and have exemplified Participate Learning’s mission of uniting our world through global learning.

This year, there were so many incredible submissions that we wanted to recognize four educators with Honorable Mentions in the following categories:

• Connections: Connections with students, colleagues at school, their community, fellow members of the Participate Learning Network, and beyond.
• Cultural Experiences: Cultural experiences they provide for students, their school, and community by sharing their own culture, recognizing all of the cultures represented in their classroom, and teaching about cultures from around the world.
• Leadership: Leadership roles they serve in on their grade level or team, within their school and district, in the Participate Learning Network, and in the community.
• Learning: Professional development opportunities that advance their own learning, as well as the creative and innovative global and/or language learning experiences that they provide for their students.

Our fourth Honorable Mention award winner is Megan Deal, a media coordinator and global lead for Fred L. Wilson Elementary School in Kannapolis City Schools in North Carolina. Ms. Deal brings passion and creativity to her role, ensuring student engagement and agency through relevant learning experiences. As a native of Kannapolis and the daughter of a media coordinator herself, she is giving back to her own community in a very special way.

Read more about all the learning experiences she has provided for her students as part of the Global Leaders framework and the professional development opportunities she has taken on throughout the 2023–24 academic year.

A global approach to deeper learning

Through Ms. Deal’s hard work and creativity, students enjoyed many engaging learning experiences this year. She blended content standards, global competencies, and experiential learning to make lessons relevant and fun.

For example, Ms. Deal planned and attended a field trip with students to the Greensboro Science Center, where they connected plants and animals they saw to their own environment, as well as to the importance of preserving water ecosystems. She planned another field trip to Camp Thunderbird, where students had to demonstrate flexibility and collaboration during an outdoor art activity.

Ms. Deal also plans global lessons and activities at school to maximize student engagement and agency. Students have learned about European holiday traditions and cultural differences. She has also facilitated students’ understanding of their own heritage, inviting them to share about family traditions or things they are thankful for. This builds students’ intercultural understanding of one another and also promotes self-awareness.

Professional learning to enhance teaching practices

Ms. Deal is constantly growing and learning to enhance her teaching practice so she can mentor other educators. She builds global knowledge for the other teachers at her school to help ensure they are aligned in their mission and vision together.

Ms. Deal was part of Participate Learning’s Global Leaders Leadership cohort and has completed professional development courses on global competencies. She has also participated in NCCAT’s program for global leaders and attended multiple conferences and other trainings this year.

We want to thank Ms. Deal for all of the wonderful and engaging learning experiences she has provided for her students this year! She is a dynamic, creative educator who brings the world to her students every day. Her commitment to continuous learning makes her a teacher leader and an example for others to follow.

To learn more about global teaching and creating deeper learning experiences, see Participate Learning’s Global Leaders framework, in which teachers like Ms. Deal are preparing students to lead in a complex world.