Inspired by great elementary school teachers, Niki Bradshaw decided the education life was for her.
Bradshaw has been with Ector County ISD for 16 years, three of which have been at Buice Elementary School as a self-contained specialized classroom teacher. Recently she earned certification from the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards.
She decided to try it because she kept getting emails about the program and thought it sounded interesting.
“I’m one of those people that I can’t ever stop being in school,” Bradshaw said.
Some informational sessions were offered over Zoom. She started it and found it was a lot of work, especially the first year because she had to go through Reading Academy, too. All kindergarten through third grade teachers, including special education teachers and principals are required to attend the House Bill 3 Reading Academies, the Texas Education Agency website details.
Bradshaw said she reached out to Director of Talent Development – National Board Certification Kelly Stansell and said she had to drop the program.
“She came and talked to me and convinced me just to give it a try,” she said.
Bradshaw added that she had three years to finish, although she completed it in two.
“I ended up sticking with it and it was actually a really good program to go through. It’s a very self-reflective program. It was hard to critique yourself that way, but it was nice because it really makes you think a little bit harder about decisions you make.”
Teachers in the program find out if they are certified through an email that goes out on the same day. If there are fireworks, you get the designation and Bradshaw did.
“I was shocked. Each year, everything is submitted at the end of April and then you don’t find out scores until mid-December. That first year when you do the first two components, you just get scores for those. It’s not a pass/fail, because then all four scores have to be averaged together to give you your total score. Each component is weighted differently, so you really have no idea. I knew I did okay on my first two components, and I kind of had an idea of what I needed to make on the last two, but you don’t know until you log in that last minute. I was pretty shocked because those last two components were rough and I felt like I was kind of pushing the deadline a little bit and so I kind of felt towards the end it was like that Hail Mary; like I just have to submit it and it is what it is. If I didn’t certify, I have another year I can redo some things so I was pretty shocked when those fireworks popped up on my screen,” she said.
Bradshaw earned a bachelor’s degree in child and family studies and a master’s in special education with an emphasis in autism in early childhood disabilities, both from University of Texas Permian Basin.
“When I first started working for the district, the classroom I taught was a classroom for students with autism. That’s all we had in our classroom. When our district went cross-categorical, it kind of opened up a whole new world of special education that I had to relearn. And special education laws and things are constantly changing so that’s one of the reasons I feel like I’m always looking for something else I can learn because it’s always changing. It’s one of those things you can never just get too comfortable in,” she said.
When she was young, Bradshaw said she wanted to be a marine biologist.
“Then I realized I didn’t like really touching fish; messing with fish. I like to look at those things. But probably halfway through elementary school, I just decided that (it) seemed like a fun job. I had really, really good elementary school teachers and decided that’s what I wanted to do. When I was in college, I started substitute teaching. Before that, I went to the Career Center for high school in the child care track, and I started working with special ed students then and really fell in love with it. And then when I started substitute teaching, those were my favorite jobs and so that’s when I decided I wanted to go into special education,” Bradshaw said.
Currently, she teaches kindergarten through fifth-grade students and has two aides.
She noted that the certification program has made her more introspective about what she’s doing and made her take a harder look at making decisions based on each student rather than a general skill.
“I feel like it made me a better teacher because it just made me be more aware of the ins and outs of why I’m doing what I’m doing,” Bradshaw said.
The district also was supportive. ECISD partnered with Stanford University and the program was paid for, teachers only paid their registration fees for each year.
“Kelly would bring by books on how to write for the components. She brought in an author of (a) book that she gave us. She did in-person workshops and then we had our Stanford national board facilitators that we could email. We had those weekly Zooms, so we did have a lot of support,” Bradshaw said.
Teachers going through the program could also bounce ideas off each other.
“That was nice to have,” Bradshaw said.
Now some of the teachers who were certified are National Board facilitators for people within ECISD, so they will have a local person to talk to.
She added that she would encourage other teachers to try the certification program, although it does take a lot of effort.
“After it was all done, it really was just making you a better teacher. Yes, we got a certificate out of it, and you have this recognition, but I would encourage teachers to do it. Most professional developments are sit-and-get like we’re going to sit, we’re gonna listen. We might take some things back to use, but this was really how to make yourself a better teacher,” Bradshaw said.
“It was definitely hard. The hardest part, I think for me, was watching the videos. I had to record myself teaching. Those were hard and then you had to write about it, and then you knew somebody else was going to watch it,” she added.
Bradshaw and her husband, Brandon, have three children.
“Niki is tenacious when it comes to teaching her students and furthering her own learning in order to improve the quality of instruction she is giving her students,” Stansell said. “In order to become a National Board Certified Teacher (NBCT) it requires 200 to 400 clock hours. That gives you an idea of the time Niki has spent on her own professional development over the last two years. ECISD is so proud of Niki and the four additional teachers who are now NBCTs. This is the most elite teacher certification in the nation.”
Also certified in December 2023 were Robert Brescia, Permian High School; Christi Nickels, Cavazos Elementary; David Cupp, Advanced Academic Services; and Shelley Wagner, English, OCTECHS.
