LifeChanger of the Year Nominee Profile

Linda Stokes was nominated anonymously.

Ms. Stokes has many career accomplishments as an educator. She has received the Teacher of the Year Award, high student growth in I-Ready Reading and Math Awards, a Leadership Award, and Mentorship Awards.

She creates a positive classroom environment through several key elements: getting to know her students and their families, setting up and maintaining an organized classroom, supporting emotional safety, establishing clear expectations, maintaining consistent routines, and fostering a respectful atmosphere all year long. The benefits of this approach include increased engagement, stronger academic performance, and reduced behavioral issues.

To support these goals, Ms. Stokes establishes clear and consistent rules, uses positive reinforcement and praise, creates predictable daily routines, and models respectful behavior and communication. She celebrates diverse perspectives and achievements while encouraging her students to meet expectations.

As an educator, Ms. Stokes believes in getting to know students individually, practicing active listening, showing genuine interest in their success, creating opportunities for student voice, and having regular check-ins. She also values maintaining open communication with families. She enjoys sharing students’ work, providing a calm atmosphere, and engaging her class in meaningful learning activities. She also shares her best practices with colleagues, continuously striving to grow as an educator.

She also emphasizes the importance of recognizing her students’ efforts. Ms. Stokes keeps a treasure box of incentives such as healthy treats, school supplies, and gift cards that motivate and reward outstanding learners. In small-group instruction, she uses dry-erase boards so students can practice skills in Reading and Social Studies, demonstrate their understanding, and receive immediate feedback.

Her students also work on projects that connect home and school learning. To complete these projects, she supplies them with colored pencils, scissors, construction paper, copier paper, glue sticks, crayons, and flash drives. These tools help students research, record notes, save their work, and create projects to present their findings to the class. Ms. Stokes believes these resources are essential for deepening knowledge, retaining information, and practicing key reading and social studies standards.