Southeast Texas P-16 Council

Jane Dunn, a chemistry teacher at Little Cypress-Mauriceville High School in the Little Cypress-Mauriceville Consolidated ISD is one of six outstanding Texas educators chosen as finalists in the Texas Teacher of the Year program.

The six finalists who have a combined 127 years of teaching experience – three elementary and three secondary school educators – were selected from the 40 regional Teachers of the Year from each of the state’s 20 education service center areas. The finalists will now contend for the honor of being named Texas Elementary Teacher of the Year and Texas Secondary Teacher of the Year award from the TEA.

The winners will be announced at an Oct. 15 luncheon at the AT&T Executive Education and Conference Center at 1900 MLK Blvd. on the University of Texas-Austin campus.

The top two teachers will receive a $5,000 cash prize, a technology package valued at more than $16,500, a computer, a trophy, a travel allowance and other mementos. A $500 cash prize is awarded to the remaining 38 regional Teachers of the Year.

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Texas members of the Class of 2010 earned the highest mathematics and science scores posted on the ACT in the past decade, even as the number of test takers rose by 12 percent this year.

The overall composite score for Texas test takers remained steady at last year’s record high score of 20.8.

“The Class of 2010 has proven itself to be a pace setter. More of these students are planning to attend college and they set new records by earning Texas’ highest math and science scores. In fact, their average math score is substantially higher than the national average for math. Most of our student groups also outperformed their counterparts nationally,” said Commissioner of Education Robert Scott.

Among the Class of 2010, 92,615 Texas seniors took the ACT, compared to 82,640 members from the Class of 2009. Much of the increase is attributed to a fee waiver that allows low-income students to take the test for free.

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