Hamilton Township High School Teacher Earns State's Highest Teaching Honor
More than 600 people packed the gymnasium of Hamilton Township High School for a night of volleyball and breast cancer awareness during the annual Volley for the Cure match against Groveport-Madison on Wednesday evening. What they didn't know was that acting State Superintendent for Public Instruction, Michael Sawyers would announce that Hamilton's own Carole Morbitzer was Ohio's newest Teacher of the Year.
Following the Junior Varsity's victory, NBC 4's Matt Barnes began hosting the pregame ceremony that takes place prior to the first serve in the varsity match. Barnes' presentation began with a recap of Rangers for the Cure successes, and then he dragged Morbitzer into the program by tossing out a challenge of registering 1,000 Rangers for the Cure this year.
He followed up the challenge by asking Mrs. Morbitzer how she became so involved in Susan G. Komen for the Cure and Komen Columbus. While she was telling her story, dignitaries and district administrators paraded in from a side door and made their way behind an unsuspecting Morbitzer.
Flanked by her team, Mrs. Morbitzer didn't notice the guests until she noticed a line of people in dark suits standing behind her athletes. Once she caught a glimpse of certain Ohio Department of Education representatives, like a good math teacher, she put two and two together before covering her shocked, tear-filled face.
Barnes introduced Sawyers to make the formal announcement that Morbitzer had indeed earned the honor of Ohio Teacher of the Year. There are more than 180,000 teachers in the great State of Ohio, and our Carole Morbitzer is the best of them all for 2012-13. State Board of Education members Kristen McKinley and Tom Gunlock joined Superintendent Sawyers for the presentation.
Also on hand was Mayor Rod Davisson who proclaimed October 3, 2012 to always be known as Carole Morbitzer Day in the Village of Obetz. Councilman John Souders was also in attendance representing the Village of Obetz.
Smart Technologies representative Gary Kurtz made the final presenation. He presented a gift of technology hardware and software to Hamilton Township High School due to it being Mrs. Morbitzer's home school building.
Others in attendance for the presentation were: ODE Contest Coordinator, Patty Griffin; 2011 Ohio Teacher of the Year, Tim Dove; Hamilton Local Schools Superintendent, Christopher Lester; and Hamilton Local Schools Director of Teaching and Learning, Dr. Susan Witten.
Carole's first duty as Teacher of the Year is to attend the upcoming State Board of Education meeting on Monday.
Congratulations to Mrs. Morbitzer on her recognition and continuing to represent our district and community in the highest regard.
Our Rangers also defeated Groveport-Madison 3-0 to win Volley for the Cure.
Read the Columbus Dispatch article here.
Read the media release from the Ohio Department of Education.