Two Hawai'i teachers win prestigious award
By Jennifer Hiller
Advertiser Education Writer
Two Hawai'i elementary school teachers were honored yesterday as among the best in their profession, winning the prestigious Milken Family Foundation National Educator Award.
Lynn Aki Johnson, who teaches third grade at Aikahi Elementary, and Leonard Villanueva, a fourth-grade teacher at Honowai Elementary, were selected.
Lynn Aki Johnson is a teacher at Aikahi Elementary.
Leonard Villanueva teaches at Honowai Elementary.
Sometimes called the Academy Awards of teaching, the Milken Award includes a $25,000 prize and paid trip to the National Educator Awards ceremony in Los Angeles in April.
The winners also will be honored at a workshop and luncheon in Honolulu on Dec. 7.
Johnson has taught for nine years, and in 1999 was one of 29 American teachers to receive a Distinguished Teacher Award from the national Council for Geographic Education. She chairs Aikahi's annual Geography Awareness Week, and her curriculum includes thematic units on topics such as the food chain, the water cycle, wetlands, geographic land forms and children around the world.
"Her humanistic qualities and values of fairness, honesty, sensitivity, caring and respect for others come through in her teaching," said complex area Superintendent Louise Wolcott.
Villanueva, who has taught for 15 years, is known as "Mr. Standards" around campus for the high expectations he sets for his students and himself. His students significantly exceed national averages on the New Standards Reference Exam that is part of the school's America's Choice curriculum. And in the school's annual reading campaign, his students always read and usually exceed the required 25 books.
"One can sense the joy of learning among his students," said Karen Moriyama, complex area superintendent. "There is an air of excitement in his room."
Hawai'i has taken part in the Milken Educator Awards since 1990. The latest awards bring to 58 the number of award winners in Hawai'i, for a total of $1.45 million.
The awards are presented annually to teachers for exceptional classroom practice, potential for professional and policy leadership and inspirational presence that motivates and impacts students, colleagues and the community.
Teachers are nominated secretly and selected by a blue-ribbon committee.
This year, $2.5 million in awards will be presented to winners nationally.
Reach Jennifer Hiller at 525-8084, or jhiller@honoluluadvertiser.com.
