Member wins top NABSE honor

Not that long ago, Michelle D. Walton was a promising student with an eye toward passing the bar after her studies in the prelaw program at Cornell University. Walton opted instead to raise the bar for students—choosing a career as a public school educator in Cleveland Heights, Ohio.

It’s a decision she’s never regretted, and time has shown that the legal profession’s loss has most definitely been education’s gain. Last November, Walton received one of the profession’s highest honors when she was named National Teacher of the Year by the National Alliance of Black School Educators (NABSE) and was inducted into the organization’s Hall of Fame, along with such notables as Rep. Chaka Fattah (D-Pa.) and entertainer/activist Smokey Robinson.

Not bad for a fifth-grade teacher who, just over a decade ago, was still trying to decide what she wanted to do for a living. “I knew I wanted to be an advocate,” remembers Walton, a member of the AFT’s Cleveland Heights local. She originally gravitated toward law in part because of her respect for the trailblazing work of such luminaries as Thurgood Marshall. But it was the one-to-one connection with students that she discovered while working as an elementary school librarian that hooked her and hooked her hard.

“Through teaching, I felt I could be an advocate for children, that my work could directly serve their hopes and aspirations for the future,” she recalls. The way Walton explains it, she didn’t choose teaching—teaching chose her. “I’ve always said that teaching may have been my second career, but it is first in my heart.”

Her work as a librarian led her to earn a master’s degree in education from John Carroll University and enter the classroom at Oxford Elementary in Cleveland Heights. By her second year, Walton was taking on additional roles to improve the profession. She worked on the first districtwide, teacher-led professional development team that trained teachers to prepare students for state writing proficiency tests.

Other achievements followed: She helped develop a revolutionary reading and math enrichment camp, served with an advisory group to implement new language arts assessments and collaborated with a team to develop a district portfolio project. In November 2001, Walton reached a professional milestone when she earned certification from the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards.

Walton views the recently won NABSE honors not as a laurel but as a springboard. She’s now immersed in projects to build school-community partnerships, provide teacher-led professional development opportunities and improve schools’ ability to effectively address the achievement gap in education. “It’s a great honor from a wonderful organization, but the real value of this type of exposure is that it increases your ability to do the work that needs to be done,” she says.

It's a frogman, it's a SEAL--it's a NYSUT retiree

Every person’s life story is written chapter by chapter, and if we’re lucky, the book is a page-turner. Charles Koulias is lucky.

After World War II, Koulias, who had served in the Marine Corps, got married; went to college; earned a bachelor’s degree in physical education, recreation and health; and started teaching physical education in the Rockland County (N.Y.) school district where he was an instructor and member of the Educational Association of South Orangetown until his retirement in 1978.

Over the years, though, one chapter in Koulias’ life has been revised—not by the author, but by the U.S. military.

As only hindsight could reveal, Koulias, a New York State United Teachers retiree, is among the pioneers of the U.S. military tactical swimming program.

In 1999, the Marine Corps gave Koulias an honorary diploma from the combatant diver program, which evolved from the Office of Strategic Services special operations diving unit established during World War II. In Koulias’ military days, members of the unit were called frogmen. Today, they are known as Navy SEALs. Because other branches of the armed services have incorporated techniques and equipment from the World War II diving unit, Koulias also has received the U.S. Army Special Forces Green Beret and a Special Forces Tab in recognition of his contributions to the military’s tactical swimming program.

The NYSUT retiree was one of five servicemen recruited to form the program to develop swimming and survival techniques, combat strategies and equipment.

“My dad noticed that a lot of Marines didn’t know how to swim,” says Koulias’ son Shaun, “so he started teaching them in a pool and it got back to a higher-up. That’s one reason they recruited my dad.”

The senior Koulias was more than a recreational swimmer, however. Prior to his military service, he had won 16 national gold and silver medals in swimming and diving as well as a national championship in the 100-meter butterfly.

When the one-time enlisted machine gunner retired as a captain after the war, his pioneering spirit remained strong. He developed a basic aquatics program for South Orangetown High and Blauvelt Elementary in Rockland County.

“He had told me about his World War II experiences, but nobody knew he was one of the original five guys who started the [diving] program,” Shaun says. “He’s a historical guy.”

Indeed he is. On March 23, Koulias started chapter 88 of his life story. But in the meantime, he has already written the conclusion.

In his words: “Old marines never die; they just sail away.”

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