Midwest Central High School teacher earns National Board Certification

[June 19, 2013]  MANITO -- Nicole Flowers-Kimmerle, a teacher at Midwest Central High School, has earned the highest credential available to American educators by recently becoming a National Board Certified Teacher through the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards.

Midwest Central High School Principal Jay Blair praised her accomplishment.

"Achieving the National Board Certification is no small feat. It is very time-consuming and rigorous," he said. "I know Nicole has benefited from this experience, and I know our students will benefit also."

National Board Certification is achieved through a rigorous, performance-based, peer-reviewed assessment of a teacher's pedagogical skills and content knowledge. The certification process takes one to three years to complete. While licensing standards set the basic requirements to teach in a state, NBCT's demonstrate advanced teaching knowledge, skills and practices similar to the certifications earned by experts in law and medicine.

New findings from Harvard University's Strategic Data Project from the LA Unified School District affirm the strong positive impact of NBCT's in the classroom. The study found that on average, National Board Certified Teachers outperform other teachers with the same levels of experience by 0.07 and 0.03 standard deviations in elementary math and English language arts respectively, which is roughly equivalent to one to two months of additional instruction.

"These latest data illustrate what education policymakers already know: Teachers who become National Board Certified are highly effective and strengthen student achievement," said Dr. Ron Thorpe, president and CEO of the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards. "They demonstrate the powerful impact that accomplished teachers have daily in their classrooms.

Flowers-Kimmerle has been at Midwest Central for seven years and currently teaches chemistry and physical science.

She graduated from the University of Illinois in Urbana with a bachelor's degree in crop science and worked on sweet corn production research for her master's degree in agronomy from the University of Wisconsin in Madison. After her master's program she worked as a research associate for Montana State University Research Farms in Billings, Mont. While in Montana, she enrolled in education classes so that she could teach students about what she had learned about science and research.

[Text from file received from Midwest Central High School]