When Crete-Monee High School Principal Lamont Holifield noticed longtime history teacher Sarah Valerio lose passion for teaching history four years ago, he knew she needed a change.
“After you’ve been teaching for a long time … you kind of end up losing that motivation that led you into the profession in the first place,” Holifield said in an interview Monday.
Holifield said he put Valerio in charge of a nascent program aimed at preparing interested students for teaching careers, in part to help reignite her own excitement for teaching. He also knew she would be good at it.
While continuing to teach AP U.S. history, Valerio has tripled the size of the Education Pathway program, hoping to combat a national teacher shortage and prepare students for a simultaneously difficult and rewarding career.
Valerio’s efforts led Holifield to nominate her for the 2025 Golden Apple Awards, of which she is one of 30 finalists.
“We have a lot of people who are in the classroom doing their thing,” Holifield said. “But is it about them or about the kids? With Sarah, I see it being about the kids.”
Another Golden Apple finalist, working at Thornton Fractional South High School about 15 miles away, is Spanish language teacher Jordan Oliva. In his fifth year of teaching in District 215, Oliva has already created spaces to help foreign language students feel more connected and recognized.
Oliva was drawn to teaching while attending Shepard High School in Palos Hills, through a program not unlike the one Valerio runs at Crete-Monee.
“They placed me in a Spanish classroom, and it was amazing,” Oliva said. “That’s where I was like, ‘yeah, I think this is what I want to do for the rest of my life.’”
Oliva himself is Mexican and grew up speaking Spanish. As a teacher in Lansing, he has prioritized creating opportunities to encourage pride in his and other cultures for students of all backgrounds to appreciate.
“I want them to feel comfortable in whatever skin they’re in, to be able to express their love for not only their culture, but for other cultures as well,” Oliva said.
Oliva said his proudest achievement as a teacher is his ability to connect with students and make them feel valued in their accomplishments.
Last year, he formed a Spanish Honor Society to celebrate “the kids that are sometimes not seen.” Participation in the group provides graduation honors and activities for students who are in their third year of a Spanish class and have maintained 3.5 GPA or above in their Spanish classes.
“These are the kids who maybe really excel at language, but they’re really not good at math or they’re really not good at English, for whatever reason,” Oliva said. “These are the kids that are really only going to get recognized if we have this type of recognition.”
Valerio said she also feels grateful to be making an impact on the students she leads and to continue building out the program that “reminds me that ‘yes, this is what I want to do.’”
She said she hopes to create more opportunities for students to intern in classrooms in the grades they hope to teach.
Valerio also said she also feels grateful to Holifield and other high school teachers for supporting her and the students in her program.
“It is a school effort,” Valerio said. “There is no way I could do this on my own.”
The Golden Apple Foundation is an Illinois nonprofit that aims to honor and retain educators “who advance educational opportunities for students,” according to the organization’s website. Recipients are expected to be named next month and will receive a cash award of $10,000, $5,000 of which will go to a project of their choosing.
ostevens@chicagotribune.com
