The Crookston School District held an award ceremony Thursday morning handing out awards for Outstanding Service to Pirate Youth (OSPY), Years of Service and Teacher of the Year. ReNee Tangquist was chosen as the Teacher of the Year by her peers.
Ann Brekken gave Tangquist her award and explains how the Teacher of the Year is chosen. “We choose our Teacher of the Year every year with a staff-wide vote,” said Brekken. “Nominations go out and teachers nominate anyone they feel they want to be recognized. We get our top vote getters and send that out through an email and that staff are able to vote for who they feel they want to recognize. It’s always a very nice honor because it’s voted on by your peers. So it’s something that we enjoy every year and a nice way to say thank you to staff members that have done a good job for our district.”
Tangquist, who has taught in the Crookston School District for 26 years currently teaches kindergarten. She has also taught first grade, preschool at UMC while part-time in kindergarten and Title 1 reading. She said it was humbling and exciting to receive the Teacher of the Year award. “It was surprising and humbling and really exciting,” said Tangquist. “I feel very grateful for the honor. And I feel like there is a whole district of teachers that should be getting that because I know how hard we all work. And we’re just all in this together working hard each day for these kids. It was very exciting, very special.”
Superintendent Jeremy Olson said it was a good morning for the staff as they also gave out the OSPY and Years of Service Awards. “It was a really good morning for our staff,” said Olson. “We gave out OSPY, Outstanding Service to Pirate Youth Award, to a community member. We also gave it out to some support staff and teachers that were very much deserving of that. We also gave out service awards for 20, 30 and 40 years of service to the district.”
Olson said that with the school year, his first with the district, over it has been a good year and he is excited for what next year will bring. “The message I want to leave everyone with is this has been a really good year,” said Olson. “I’ve been very appreciative of the staff and the community support. And the direction we’re going I’m just very excited to see what next year brings as well. It was a great first year for me as superintendent. I was excited to work with this very positive staff. Wonderful people to work with and I see positive things on our horizon.”
AWARDS
Teacher of the Year: ReNee Tangquist
OPSY Community: Chris Fee
OSPY Districtwide Support: Peter Hyde
OSPY Customer Service: Marlene Murray
OSPY Washington School: Stacy Olson, Lynette Nordine-Goosen
OSPY Highland School: Tina Leach, Terry Clauson
OSPY Crookston High School: Susan Dufault, Linda Morgan
OSPY Extracurricular: Phyllis Hagen
20 Years of Service: Joan Darco, Mike Delorme, Trish Erdmann, Karen Hanson, Janel Kresl, Jeff Perreault, Marlys Plencner, Janice Proulx, Janice Proulx, Karen Reierson
30 Years of Service: Dee Sperling, Marjean Sanderson, Marcia Scholler
40 Years of Service: Belinda Fjeld, Randy Hviding
