Published February 27, 2020 by Anna Martens ’20

Bowdoin Teacher Scholars both learn and teach in the classroom

Four Bowdoin Teacher Scholars started their semesters on January 2, three weeks before Bowdoin students and professors were back in class. Teacher Scholars teach alongside their mentor teacher in the classroom five days a week. Here is a quick introduction to this semester’s Teacher Scholars!

2020 Cohort — Left to right Teacher Scholars Anne Gregory, Molly Prouty, Erin Houlihan, and Carmen Caterina.

This year’s cohort consists of three postgraduates and one undergraduate, all women. They span four core subject areas and represent four different secondary schools in southern Maine.

Carmen Caterina ’20 is teaching English at South Portland High School with a mentor teacher who is a Bowdoin graduate. Caterina is grateful to be in BTS during her last semester at Bowdoin: “I feel lucky to ease into my future career with so much support from the college... [BTS] is also making me appreciate everything that my dad—himself a teacher—and my mom did for me during my childhood after their long work days… things that I substitute with much-needed naps after spending 6 hours with energetic 14- and 15-year-olds.”

Anne Gregory ’19 teaches social studies at Casco Bay High School in Portland. Her mentor is both a BTS and a Bowdoin alumnus. Gregory appreciates the value of this as her first full teaching experience: “The school itself is so unique in its approach to community-building, prioritizing restorative justice when it comes to discipline, and relying on strong foundations of student-teacher relationships. This has been modeled for me by my mentor teacher... his rapport and trusting relationships with students has been so inspiring.”

Molly Prouty ’19 is also at the high school level, teaching math at Yarmouth High School with a Bowdoin alum mentor. Prouty notes, “BTS has been both a wonderful and a challenging experience. I'm still trying to figure out my own teaching style, including how to command the classroom effectively and authentically... It's been great to have my mentor teacher as a support system because he knows his students, the curriculum, and the culture of the school so well.”

Erin Houlihan ‘’17 is teaching science at Lyman Moore in Portland. She is the only one in a middle school and is loving it so far. “8th grade science... is engaging content at an age when the students are really able to start grappling with it. It's fun to spark their curiosity and get them excited about science! The students participated in an engineering challenge where they designed a structure, using newspaper and tape, to protect an egg from 30 lbs being dropped on it. There were some really epic eggsplosions!”

Across these different experiences, the Bowdoin network is strong: three of four mentor teachers for this year’s Teacher Scholars are also Bowdoin alumni. Besides teaching full time, Teacher Scholars participate in a weekly seminar with Assistant Professor of Education Alison Miller, and will finish the semester with a Maine teaching certificate.