Meredith Wales, teacher, Skyview High School

Meredith Wales

Skyview High School English and leadership teacher Meredith Wales has been named a Summer Scholar by the National Endowment for the Humanities. In July, she and 24 other teachers from across the U.S. will travel to the University of Texas at El Paso to participate in a two-week program titled “Tales from the Chihuahuan Desert: Borderlands Narratives about Identity and Binationalism.”

Wales plans to apply insights from the program when she returns to Skyview in the fall, seeing opportunities to gain resources and activities that will help her and her colleagues honor diverse student voices and introduce new perspectives into the classroom.

“I think that what I’ll be researching will bring back approaches that can be tailored to any particular student identity,” said Wales. “As a teacher of teenagers, I see how being able to explore your identity and those of others helps during a key developmental stage in a young adult’s life. The more that I can bring into my classroom and share with others, the more opportunities we will thus have to foster an important component in coming of age.”

The National Endowment for the Humanities is a federal agency that supports summer enrichment opportunities for educators to study with experts in humanities disciplines. This year, approximately 512 Summer Scholars from across the country will participate in 23 seminars and institutes. The 25 teachers selected for “Tales from the Chihuahuan Desert” each will receive a stipend of $2,100 to cover their travel, study and living expenses.