Ms. Freeman, Paint Branch’s new first-year math teacher, grew up in Rhode Island, where she attended Barrington High School. After high school, she went to the University of Delaware, where in the last semester of her senior year, she received the Most Outstanding Student Teacher award she said happily, “I was very honored.” As a child, she was inspired by some of her teachers and wanted to become a teacher so she too could be an inspiration for students. “They pushed me and made me try, rather than just letting me give up.”

   Ms. Freeman’s favorite subject, obviously, is math because she likes to solve equations. She says, “It’s what I’m best at.” Her least favorite subject is English because, she laughs, “I’m not too good at writing papers.”

   After college, she wanted to move close to Washington D.C. because she wanted to live in the city and Delaware, where she went to college, was close by. She heard that Montgomery County was a good place to work, so she applied for a job at Paint Branch. Sahar Husain, Ms. Freeman’s first-period student, states, “She is fun and exciting.” Before Paint Branch, Ms. Freeman worked at Concord High School in Delaware as an Algebra 2 student teacher.

   Ms. Freeman feels that the faculty is very supportive and helpful to her as a new teacher, but the students can be very challenging. The hardest part of the job to her is trying to relate to the students, getting them to do their work, and maintaining interest. The best part of her job occurs when students come in for help and actually want to succeed: “it’s a good time to get to know students and work with them one-on-one.”

   One aspect to being a new teacher that is more difficult than she expected is that “it’s a lot more work and time-consuming, but I enjoy it”.