00:00I teach English that includes our journalism program, AP Language, English 10, and then I also teach survival stories.
00:12I was born here and so I graduated from here. This was the place where I felt like I could give back to students what was given to me.
00:22I came from this like all-star list of teachers.
00:25Ms. Williams was my junior year journalism teacher. She saw potential in me that I didn't see in myself.
00:31If I could do for one student what Ms. Williams did for me, then that would be a career well spent.
00:38Ashley is a student, always asking questions. She was a fun student to have and that sort of carries over in teaching too.
00:46My job to me inherently is to teach students how to communicate.
00:51Project-based learning is process-based learning and I have a better gauge of my students' skills and competencies when I can see their process.
01:02Building that creativity is how we help our students solve the problems that don't exist yet.
01:06Well, I've known Ashley now since 2003, 2004. I was her high school principal.
01:11I think one of the strengths of Ashley Croston is she goes outside her classroom walls cross-curricular.
01:17I know she involves tech ed. She involves art. She wants to find that place where the student says,
01:24Hey, I connected the dots.
01:27The thing that I see that Ashley brings to our teaching community is just that. It's the community.
01:33She wants everybody to be involved.
01:36Ms. Croston leads by example for her colleagues. She is very good at fostering relationships with her students.
01:42She was the first teacher who told me that, like, I could do more and that I needed to push myself to do more.
01:47And she recommended me for AP language. She made sure that I knew that I could do it.
01:54I was good enough to do it and I had her full support to do it.
01:57She really does see the best in everybody and sees what these kids can do.
02:01For her to have this honor, that's pretty special. And show you can come from anywhere and do great things.
02:07One of the things that I love about the schedule that I teach right now is I often have students for multiple years.
02:13And so I get to see who they were and who they become.
02:17Minna took journalism sophomore year and she failed the class the first time.
02:22But I looked at Minna and I was like, I know that this girl has tremendous potential and she needs a space where she can be a leader.
02:29I think this is the space to do that. And she was phenomenal our senior year.
02:35But we get close to the end of the year and she's not walking at graduation.
02:39She has a class from sophomore year that she has to make up and so she can't walk.
02:42She had to finish that class. I wrote her a graduation card.
02:45Minna, first off, let's be very clear. The second you finish the Alpha classes, a graduation celebration is coming your way.
02:51The day in the end does not matter. All that matters is that you make it because you deserve to make it.
02:56A few weeks later, she sent me a picture and it was a tattoo and it says you deserve to make it in my handwriting.
03:06And I was just like a mess. The next picture she sent was her diploma.
03:12Those stories were like, it didn't all go as planned and my students overcame it and they did so, you know, pretty much on their own.
03:22Don't cry. Don't cry.
03:24Like that's, that's how I knew that I've turned them into adults that will find happiness and joy and success because they deserve it.
03:34Having good teachers is important. Having great teachers is necessary. And you find them in every community and every school.
03:43To have this opportunity come to Mifflin County and to be able to share it with all these people who are 100% the reason that I'm here and the reason that I teach here is the coolest thing that I could have given back.
03:55I'm Ashley Crossan and I am the 2025 National Teacher of the Year.
04:02Do you believe that?
04:03Like that, it was?
04:04As she was inside the premise.
04:06Like that we encountered 10 seconds ago, she found her career and she found others like you.
04:10Let me tell you about everything who can tell us and dream well over the beach.
04:17Then I asked her, I said that what she says about her and to be able to live or рай ADM Dowels?
04:21All I thought she mentioned before.
04:23We decided she's upset about from her and to get the picture of the weird어�台 I wrote on.
