Teacher of the Year challenges students and they love her for it
Published: July 5, 2006
She always knew she wanted to be a teacher. Only, she pictured herself in a classroom full of third- and fourth-graders and even student taught at Cottonwood Elementary School.
Instead, Jeni Zapatka started her career at Ridgetop Junior High School in the winter of 1995, midway though the school year.
“I hadn’t been in a junior high since I was in junior high,” Zapatka said.
A 1990 South Kitsap High School graduate and later a Western Washington University alumna, Zapatka was surprised to be hired off of her first job interview. More surprising still, she found she enjoyed teaching junior high students.
Now, Zapatka says she absolutely loves the age group and couldn’t picture herself in any other classroom.
Her students love her back and so do parents and colleagues, who recently banded together to make Zapatka Central Kitsap’s 2006 Teacher of the Year.
“She works very hard to make sure we understand,” said eighth-grader Paige Stoker.
“Some people may think she’s strict, but she’s not,” Stoker added. “Everything we do is not busy work, it helps us.”
Challenging students was precisely the incentive behind two advanced programs Zapatka helped launch at Ridgetop.
As the building’s gifted students’ mentor, Zapatka frequently spoke with parents who felt their children were not challenged enough at school.
“There was nothing in junior high for students who learn things quickly,” Zapatka said.
She and her teaching partner in the 1990s, Pam Borromeo, spent a year planning a new program, meeting with parents, Advanced Placement teachers at the high schools, and district administrators.
“At the time we heard that gifted kids had the highest drop-out rate in college,” Zapatka recalled.
She and Borromeo wanted to challenge Ridgetop advanced students as a way to keep them engaged in school work.
“We wanted them to be frustrated and wanted them to hit walls,” Zapatka said. “We want kids to learn how to learn.”
Thus the Humanities in Depth (HID) program for seventh- and eighth-grade students was born in 1997-98. It involves an extended curriculum: U.S. history and language arts the first year; world geography, contemporary culture and language arts for second year students.
The HID program necessitated another one — bringing pre-AP courses to Ridgetop’s freshmen.
Zapatka was not only demanding of her students, but continued to further her knowledge as well. In 1998 she obtained a master’s degree in creative arts and education.
“It made me a better teacher,” she said, adding she has since integrated art projects in her classes.
Three years ago she added sociology and U.S. history certifications to her teaching credentials.
“Her curriculum is original, her approach to teaching students is original,” said Loisanne Sykes, Zapatka’s team teacher of five years. “She teaches the students and the parents.”
Denise Mangarelli would second that. She has three sons who have been in Zapatka’s classes, including eighth-grader, going into ninth, Kyle Echevarria who is going to be in her pre-AP English class in the fall.
Mangarelli’s youngest son, Conor Mangarelli, will be a second-grader in Brownsville Elementary School next year.
“I hope she’s still teaching when he gets up to her school because she’s truly deserving of this award,” Mangarelli said. “She’s an awesome teacher.”
Mangarelli, who was a grade-school teacher in California, praised Zapatka from the perspective of both a parent and a fellow educator.
She teaches students the importance of teamwork by modeling it with her own team-taught HID program, Mangarelli said.
When Sykes solicited letters of recommendation for Zapatka’s Teacher of the Year nomination, Mangarelli jumped at the chance and so did her oldest sons — Sean and Kevin Carhart, both Central Kitsap High School graduates.
“Both of them say she’s the best teacher they’ve ever had, the most influential,” Mangarelli said.
Sean, who is now a University of Washington student, says the three years when he was in Zapatka’s classes prepared him for all future endeavors, his mother said.
“The class also prepares us for when we’re older,” Stoker said.
And not just for ninth grade, but beyond — for taking AP classes in high school and for writing at a college level, she added.
Current HID students of Zapatka’s, like Stoker and eighth-grader Aimee Rozier, hope to be assigned to her section of pre-AP English classes in the fall.
“She always listens to what we have to say,” Rozier said. “She’ll add things in the curriculum that we want.”
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