Staff member Michelle Kennison is new to SCHS and teaches ninth and tenth grade English. She earned her bachelor’s degree in social and behavioral science at California State University, Monterey Bay and received her master’s in teaching at Bellarmine University in Kentucky.
Outside of school, Kennison enjoys reading, watching movies and online shopping. With her family’s history in teaching and love for public speaking, Kennison was inspired to become an English teacher.
“I’ve always felt like I was a very good public speaker, and then I was like, ‘What job am I going to do that allows me to work with history, storytelling and public speaking?’ Everything pointed to teaching,” Kennison said. “It felt like it was a career that I could go into that fit my personality as well as my own personal interests.”
Kennison’s passion for teaching did not come immediately, leading to her experimenting with other professions prior to becoming a teacher.
“I was a tour guide. I was a telemarketer. I worked in insurance for a little while and it was really difficult for me to be in a cubicle at an office all day, so I was like I need to do something else, something different,” Kennison said.
Kennison taught middle schoolers at Bridges Academy before switching to high schoolers here at SCHS. She looks forward to the change and views it as a way to see the various stages of her students’ life.
“With (grades) nine and ten, I feel like I’ve gotten to move up and to see that next stage of the teenage high school experience, of being able to get to better understand my students through a broader lens of what it is like to go to high school in a modern area,” Kennison said. “I remember my own high school experience, but it was so vastly different.”
One of the reasons Kennison felt drawn to SCHS was because of its inclusive community. According to Kennison, the diversity of the school allows for multiple perspectives to be represented.
“I felt like Santa Clara, it had a blend, and it didn’t define itself based on the demographic of its students. It kind of said, ‘We’re diverse. We have students of all different backgrounds, all different socioeconomic levels,’” Kennison said. “That really appealed to me as a teacher because I’ve always wanted to be in a classroom where you have those multiple perspectives represented in the classroom.”
Kennison emphasizes a supportive classroom community and hopes her students feel welcomed in class.
“School is tough, and it’s sometimes just something you gotta do. But I don’t want students to be like, ‘Oh God, I have to go to Ms. Kennison’s class.’ Oh no. I want to be like, ‘Oh, school sucks, but I’m gonna go to Ms. Kennison’s class, and that class isn’t so bad,’” Kennison said. “Hopefully, they see it as more than that, then at least a space that everybody feels welcomed and comfortable to come to every day.”
One of Kennison’s goals for this year is to be able to provide support for all of her students. No matter their differences, she believes that a strong support system and bond with her students is the key to their growth and success.
“We’re all still human. We all space out. We all still need to have things to focus us and bring us back. It helps all of us to have things put into a simplified language where the material can be accessible,” Kennison said. “It doesn’t really matter what your intelligence level, your background is. It’s the support.”