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Can you tell us about yourself? 

Hi, my name is Kayla Springfield. I work at Costona Elementary School in Lufkin, Texas, and the library media specialist here. I've been here at Costona, or this is my third year. I've been in the district now for 10 years.

Why did you start a career in education?

I started a career in education. I kind of started later in life. I have a degree in something else at first. I had started my first job outside of college in the banking industry. And we had a regular customer who came in and tried to recruit me. She was a principal at one of the schools nearby. Um, so I took her advice and I went back to school and ended up with my master's degree in education, which is kind of crazy because both of my parents are teachers. I guess I was just, you know, in denial that that's what I needed to do in life.

If you could have any other job what would it be and why?

I would probably stay in the education field. I feel like I'd want to get in something similar to curriculum design or maybe some type of educational research. I think that would be interesting. 

How are kids different now than 30 years ago?

I think, you know, from 30 years ago, obviously there's the technology aspect of things, but I feel now, like there's more pressure for children to grow up faster. I feel like we've kind of sped up their childhood. They have a lot more responsibilities when they're younger. I just remember when I was young being outside until the lights came on, it's just a different time, um, that I feel like these kids are missing out on. Maybe safety-wise and just some other things

How is teaching different now than 30 years ago?

So teaching is different now than 30 years ago. I'm thinking the first thing that came to mind was standardized tests. I feel like a lot of our education is focused on standardized testing and at the end of the year, and we take lots of benchmark tests and CVA tests and we teach based on that, you know, fortunately at my school, I feel like we teach the whole child, um, as well as the standardized test. But I feel like as a whole, that's kind of the way education is moving.

What would you tell someone who wants to become a teacher?

I would tell them that it can be very challenging at times. A lot of times I'll ask people, why do you want to be a teacher? And they just respond with, well, I love kids. Well, that is very important, to love kids. But I also think that to become a teacher, you need to love the challenge as well. Of course it's not always challenging. Some days you have days that aren't as challenging as others, but it will be challenging at times.

What would you change to help kids learn better?

And if I could change something to help kids learn better, I think I would include more experiences in their learning. A lot of the students that we have here are low income and they don't have a lot of real-world experiences. It's hard for them to relate things to their education. They don't have that schema and the background information. So I feel like if they could get that hands-on real-world experience, I think that they might relate the topic to their life better. All right. And those are my seven questions.