“You can’t ever let them think they can give up. Failure is not an option,” Crow said.
The 61-year-old Crow, whose parents were Middletown School graduates – “I have a lot of Middie blood in me” – spent most of her career working in what was once Butler County’s oldest school building.
For decades she taught in the former Middletown High School, which later became Vail Middle School before the school was torn down in 2018.
Now Crow works in one of the region’s most modern schools – Middletown Middle School, which opened in September 2018.
“My specialty is focusing on reading but I also co-teach science and history.
Elizabeth Beadle, spokeswoman for Middletown Schools, described the 40-year-veteran as an example of dedication seen among many of the district’s 650 employees have for the city schools.
“When you come to Middletown, you quickly learn the saying ‘Once a Middie, Always a Middie’ is very true. We have many employees who start and end their careers in Middletown Schools,” said Beadle.
The changes in schools and teaching have been many since 1980, said Crow.
The two biggest?
“Technology and the concept of group teaching,” she said referencing the practice at the middle school where students have the same group of teachers as the advance grades.
“We work in teams and the benefit of working together is everybody has their areas of strength,” she said.
One of the joys, she said, of teaching so long in the same district is the experience of now teaching the children of students she taught decades ago.
“I feel blessed to have second generation students.”
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