Bel Air High School Teacher Wins Teacher Of The Year 2018

BEL AIR, MD — The Harford County Public Schools 2018 Teacher of the Year is from Bel Air High School. Dr. Paula Stanton was the winner of the coveted award, school officials announced Wednesday night during the annual Teacher of the Year Banquet at the Bayou Restaurant in Havre de Grace.

Dr. Stanton is the chair of the English Department at Bel Air High School. She teaches at the Center for Educational Opportunity and serves on the Bel Air High School Unity Committee and the Harford County Public Schools Novel Review Committee.

She earned her PhD. in education from Walden University and has a bachelor's degree in English and secondary education from Howard University. Before coming to Harford County Public Schools, Stanton spent 16 years working as an educator in Maryland and Washington, D.C. She has worked in Harford County for eight years.

To qualify for the award, candidates had to be nominated and be teachers in Harford County Public Schools for at least five years. Students, guardians, colleagues and administrators could submit nominations.

Once nominations were received for Harford County's Teacher of the Year, applications were scored by a panel of judges. The panel included the student school board representative, a PTA representative, former Teacher of the Year recipient, administrators and community/business representatives, according to Harford County Public Schools spokeswoman Jillian Lader. The finalists for Harford County Teacher of the Year were announced in February, and in the weeks since, each finalist was visited in the classroom before a winner was determined.

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The 2017 Teacher of the Year was Amy Mangold of John Archer School.

Pictured, Dr. Paula Stanton at the Teacher of the Year banquet. Photo courtesy of Harford County Public Schools.