Golden Apple Award: Jami Thomason, Ocoee Middle School

CLEVELAND, Tenn. (WDEF) – Good teachers are good listeners. Pair that with kindness and a healthy respect for others, and you get a great learning environment. That’s just what Jami Thomason has created in her Ocoee Middle School classroom. So, we decided to honor her with this week’s Golden Apple.

Chris Doan is the 7th grade assistant principal at Ocoee.

She explains, “Miss Thomason is a first-year teacher for Ocoee. She came from Chattanooga, and so this is her first-year teaching ELA in the eighth grade, and then she also teaches our STEM club. She is the sponsor for the STEM club and has done a lot of work there.”

When asked to describe herself, Ms. Thomason, “I am a mother, a friend, a teacher. This is my 19th year. I’ve also been a coach. It’s my career.  I love it very much. My mother was a teacher for 40 years. Yeah. And she was amazing at her job. She won all kinds of awards and things, and I just knew. I just wanted to be like her.”

We asked some of her students to describe her.

They said, “She’s really funny and nice.”

“She always wants to help us.”

“She’s my favorite teacher.”

“We can always talk to Miss Thomason about anything.”

“Not only does she help with work, but if I have problems, I always choose to go to Miss Thomason.”

Ms. Thomason continues, “It’s really special to me to build relationships with them and watch them turn into good people, because that’s one of my goals is to… you know I teach them the standards they’re supposed to know for those test and stuff, but I want them to become good people later in life, too.”

Another student chips in, “She always willing to sit there and help you and listen to your problems. And she’s really good to communicate to with and she’s just a good teacher in general.”

Ms. Thomason concludes, “I love being able to see them develop and grow, not only learning. I mean, I love it when they learn, and their lightbulbs go off, and they can see, but I love seeing how they act and how they treat other people and treat me.  it just makes my heart happy. When I was in junior high, I went through a phase where I wanted to go into physical therapy and be an oncologist. I just kind of went back and forth. But I started off, wanting to be a teacher and ended high school wanting to be a teacher.  So, I just want them to know hopefully they can look back and see that I tried to make things fun, and that I cared about them. ”