Crystal Award winner Selma Prewitt guides a classroom project

Thornwood Elementary School third-grade teacher Selma Prewitt was one of six teachers honored Feb. 3 during the annual Crystal Awards benefit and gala dinner held at the Hilton Houston Post Oak.

The record-breaking 2006 Crystal Awards was sponsored by the Spring Branch Education Foundation and the Houston Chronicle, with Wal-Mart as the Platinum Crystal underwriter. Selma Prewitt and five other public and private school teachers were honored at the event.

As award recipients, winning educators received a $500 check from the Houston Chronicle, a Waterford crystal apple from the Foundation and scholarships for further studies at Houston Baptist University and the Houston Community College System.

“We’re looking at this year’s Crystal Awards as a record-breaking event. The entire evening was simply fabulous,” Spring Branch Education Foundation Administrator Cece Thompson said.

She expects the proceeds from the gala and auction to raise more than $100,000. More than 500 people attended the event, which benefits the education foundation and the Houston Chronicle’s Readers are Leaders Foundation.

Crystal Award winner Selma Prewitt

“This incredible fund-raising effort will enable the Spring Branch Education Foundation to provide more support to our district mentoring program, as well as additional district and campus initiatives,” Thompson also said.

Crystal Awards Chair was Lydia Junek, who is the wife of Foundation Board Member and Chairman-elect Gary Junek.

District vendors, including PBK Architects and Satterfield & Pontikes Construction, supported the event as Silver Crystal Underwriters. Wal-Mart, as a Platinum Crystal Underwriter, also honored its 2005 Teachers of the Year during the gala benefit.

More than half of SBISD’s 2005 Teacher of the Year nominees also attended and were recognized for high achievement. Several campus PTAs honored their nominees by sponsoring individual seats or tables at the event.

Crystal Award winner Selma Prewitt was nominated by several Thornwood Elementary colleagues, including 2005 SBISD Elementary Teacher of the Year Michelle Grant-Arastu, Paula Duplechin and Cora Everage. Prewitt has been named Thornwood Teacher of the Year twice in her 13-year career teaching third and fourth grades.

A native of Ohio and graduate of Bowling Green State University, Prewitt is the first college graduate in her family. Her parents, who worked in factories all their lives, are retired and now live with Selma here.

“It was a total surprise,” Prewitt says of her Crystal Award. “I was speechless when it was announced here at school. I didn’t know how big a deal it was until I learned that there were 1,400 applications and only six winners.”

Her mother, Kathy, wept joyously when she was told the news. Both parents attended the Crystal Awards dinner.

Left to right: 2006 Crystal Awards Chair Lydia Junek; Committee Members Becky Funderburk, Nanette Putterman, Claire Martin and Susan Patt; Spring Branch Education Foundation and Committee Member Debra Aitken; and Committee Member Wendy Moreland. Not pictured: Committee Members Kathleen Johnnson, Mary Card, Sheri Iler and Janell Kellher, and Board Members Janet Horton, Lisa Schwartz and Elizabeth Stein.

Prewitt’s teaching style is creative, hands-on and engaging. She dresses up as Captain Hook to encourage students to read Peter Pan. For a holiday project, students built wooden tissue box covers and learned how to measure surface area and perimeter as they worked.

To illustrate the meaning of chemical change, her wide-eyed students have dropped Efferdent denture-cleaning tablets into water and then used stop watches to time cleansing action.

Her 21 third-graders can recite the Pledge of Allegiance using sign language, one of many enrichment activities they have undertaken in the class.

“I want my students to think for themselves and to observe the connections between things that they often read or hear about. I like to do things that are creative, and away from the textbook,” Prewitt said. “You can have fun and learn at the same time.”

Prewitt has mentored new teachers for several years, and her teaching ability wins praise from teachers, parents and Thornwood Elementary Principal Mary McMillan.

“She is one of the most creative teachers I have ever experienced. Every single day her students are doing something creative, and they don’t even realize that they are learning,” Principal McMillan said.

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posted 02-15-06