About the Author

Erica Speaks started her journey as a middle school educator in 2000. She currently teaches language arts at a multi-track year-round public middle school in North Carolina. She earned her National Board Certification in 2004 and earned National Board Renewal in 2014. Named a Class of 2013 Kenan Fellow in NC State’s Kenan Fellows Program for Curriculum and Leadership Development, she was tasked with Creating a Virtual Library of Common Core Concepts for Site-Based Professional Development.  DPI will use these materials in training educators throughout the state. They can be viewed here.

Before beginning her journey as a educator in the classroom, she earned her B.A. in Psychology and her M.A. in Teaching in 1999 and 2000, respectively, both from The University of South Carolina in Columbia, SC.

She and her husband have two young boys and live in Raleigh, NC.

8 thoughts on “About the Author”

  1. I earned a BA in Psychology in 2000. Same year, I completed the remainder of my K-6 Elementary Education Certification program. I began teaching in July of 2001. By August of 2003, I had left teaching and started an MS program. By January of 2005, I was making nearly double my starting teacher’s salary from 2001 working a co-op position in RTP. Co-op. Student worker. Within 2 years at the same company (I’d been hired as a full-time employee) I was making the salary I would have expected to make by the time I had taught for 20 years in NC. 20 years!

    I won’t even tell you how much I make now, but I can tell you I would have had to work two teaching jobs concurrently to come close to it. I love my job, and I appreciate the opportunities that my MS has afforded me in Corporate America, but at the same time? It makes me feel sad, because what I wanted to do was teach. I simply could not afford to be a teacher. North Carolina will slowly push out all but the worst teachers, with only a handful of decent teachers who are fortunate enough not to need a paycheck and fortunate enough to be at a school where their coworkers and principal offer just enough support for the teaching staff to hang in there and do what they love to do… teach.

    The rest? All gone. Nothing left but glorified babysitters. It disgusts me.

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    1. Thank you for sharing your thoughts and the data. I hope this article helps to further educate the public about the teaching profession.

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    2. I’m really glad I found your blog, Erica 🙂 We really need your voice in NC. I’m a student at NC State and really passion about how we can fund education. I started a company called Pennies 4 Progress. We fund unfunded schools, classrooms and teachers. We could use your help to get started. We think you should check out how… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQVu256MV0Q

      I’m really interested in learning from you and will be following your blog. If you have any questions about Pennies 4 Progress or would like to help us, I’d love to chat with you.

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      1. What a fabulous initiative! I’ve tweeted your video to my followers and the #edchat community. Please let me know how I could help this wonderful endeavor!

        Many thanks for what you are doing for the children of NC.

        ~Erica

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  3. Pingback: This Mortal Coil - #MoreHomework

  4. Love your blog. I have followed you for several years. I retired last year after 25 years teaching HS art in NC. I would love to share you posts on my FB page, but I can only find a FB like button. Am I missing something?

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    1. Hello Melissa,

      I’m so honored you’ve been following! Thank you for your years of service and dedication to NC students.

      You weren’t missing anything, the site was. I’d never been able to get it to work. Redetermined by your encouragement, I re-looked into it today. It took some time and I will spare you a long, boring technical explanation that involves plug ins vs. widgets and terminology for WordPress.COM vs. WordPress.ORG … Just suffice it to say the social media share buttons should finally show on TSV now. 😀

      Thank you so much for your comment! It’s helped me make figure out an overdue improvement and really made my day.

      ~Erica 🙂

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