Student's wish is to become a teacher

Toni Miller, 14, says she's "proud" to be a part of this year's Bishop Appeal.

The eighth-grader at Blessed Sacrament School in Albany, who appears in promotional materials for the annual campaign, maintains a 93 average, and loves softball and basketball, watching soap operas, and playing with her black Labrador Retriever, Schuyler.

Inspired by her teachers, Toni aspires to be a teacher in a Catholic school. Catholic schools receive funding through contributions to the Bishop's Appeal.

Role models

Since she started at Blessed Sacrament in the first grade, Toni has grown close to many of her teachers. They're friendly, she explained, and help students adapt to new situations and difficult lessons.

They also listen, she continued, and go the extra mile to help her when she doesn't understand something.

"I like my teachers so much, and I want to be like them," she said.

Teacher qualities

Toni would like to emulate teachers who don't punish the whole class for one student's misbehavior, who provide free hugs on request and who helped her first count money, when she erased her worksheet so many times the eraser went "through the paper."

She admires teachers who find "cool, creative" ways of explaining difficult math concepts, who have taught meditation in religion class, who listen if students need to talk (no matter what topic they want to discuss) and who get involved in everything from the Stations of the Cross to cheering at sports games.

From her teachers, Toni said, she has learned that "the most important thing is patience. Students aren't always at the same level. Creativity makes the class more fun. I think I have a lot of patience, and I like to change things up a little bit."

Expanding classroom

Toni believes that teaching today's 14-year-olds takes a little more than lecturing.

Teachers should "explain a little more," she said, and connect geography lessons to maps or math to games. Teachers shouldn't "talk all the time" and should work real-world examples in with their lessons.

For example, this year, she's enjoyed trips to a Trappist monastery, a career fair and a "forensic lab" experiment run by Siena College students.

Moving up

Next year, Toni will attend Bishop Maginn High School in Albany, where she hopes to play shortstop for the softball team and get involved with the many clubs the school offers.

She's a little daunted by the challenges ninth-grade math presents, as well as the switch from "religion" to "theology," but she intends to take it all in stride.

"My favorite subject is math," she said, noting that she enjoys working the Pythagorean theorem and doing geometry. "Even though I struggle with it, the moment when you know how to do it -- that's when it gets fun."

Nevertheless, ninth grade is "going to be a big change," she said.

Advice

Toni is an altar server at Blessed Sacrament Church and helps out with funerals during the day as well as serving the Saturday vigil Mass quite often.

"I like helping," she said. "You think of good stuff when you think of God." She joked that, like many students, "I pray every day -- and extra when I have a big test."

Toni advises new middle-schoolers to "give people a chance. Maybe the first impression isn't best to really show you who they are. Don't judge a book by its cover. Let the teachers do their work, pay attention and work hard."

(Toni's mother, Terri, works in the diocesan Development Office Blessed Sacrament School is a family tradition for the Millers; Toni's father, Joe, attended, as did her older sister and brother.)

(4/19/07) [[In-content Ad]]