“Teaching is my calling,” said Miami Lakes Educational Center's Teacher of the Year, Raquel Hernandez. “My mother often mentions that as a little girl I would play with my dolls and teach them what I had learned in school. What I find most fulfilling about my job is the fact that for me it is not work at all. Confucius said, ‘Find a job you love and you will never work a day in your life’.”
Hernandez obtained her bachelor's degree from Barry University and a master's degree from the University of Miami, both in the field of education. She taught third, fourth and fifth grade at Hialeah Gardens Elementary School for 10 years and transferred to Barbara Goleman Senior High School as a reading coach. Ultimately she took the opportunity to work at Miami Lakes Educational Center first as a reading coach and currently as an Intensive Reading Instructor for grades 9 through 12.
Hernandez, who believes that the classroom environment needs to be a healthy foundation for students to grow, sees the potential in each of her students to create a world better than the one that came before them.
“I view my students as living monuments that transcend time. In each student I see the next scientist, engineer, doctor, lawyer, and teacher. My role as a teacher is to promote a positive classroom experience, one which fosters a highly motivational approach where learning always takes place,” said Hernandez.
As reading coach, Hernandez frequently advocates the creed that all children have the potential to experience success. She offers support and resources to colleagues and nurture's the belief that a student's growth is a collaborative effort.
In addition to her time with students in the classroom, Hernandez has been a Project CRISS (creating independence through student-owned strategies) trainer since 1995, and was previously nominated for Teacher of the Year in 2000.
Hernandez, whose students struggle with reading, is always moved when students react positively to reading, and it further reinforces the idea that all students can become successful.
“Many students have a negative connotation towards reading and it impacts me when students tell me, ‘This is the first time I have read a book cover to cover.’ It's memorable when students embrace reading in their lives,” said Hernandez.
Much like her favorite quote, “Children are apt to live up to what you believe of them,” said by former first lady Claudia Taylor Johnson, Hernandez believes in her students, and it appears students always rise to the occasion with the help of supportive teachers.