“Once you stop learning, you start dying,” Albert Einstein (Good Reads). Mr. Einstein spoke these iconic words over 100 years ago; yet, for Kim Van Es these words still resonate with truth as her favorite quote. Learning is high on her list of important tasks in life because she is a teacher, though her secret dream is to be a docent. For twenty years she has invested her time and life into Northwestern College and its students. Life rotates around the people in her life. Kim Van Es lives a life consciences of not just of herself, but also the world.
First and foremost, Ms. Van Es is aware of the people around her. In 2013, she won the first ever Faculty Award for Inspirational Service given for going above and beyond expectations, personifying …show more content…
In her own words, “when you teach writing, there is a personal aspect in it; there’s a vulnerability involved and being a safe place for people to share their experiences has been a really rewarding thing for me.” Though she has only been at Northwestern College for twenty years, Ms. Van Es has been teaching writing for over thirty years in high schools and colleges combined. In addition, she loves teaching college writing because of the stage of life college students are at. However, she has a secret that a majority of her students wouldn’t be able to guess at. Public speaking is her worst fear. She has performance anxiety due to her perfectionistic side every time she speaks, whether that be in the classroom or for an event. For every class she taught, she would spend hours on an hour’s worth of class time. Which is why when her students and faculty put together a scrapbook for her this past spring, Ms. Van Es was very touched. One of the most heart-warming compliments she received was when a student wrote: Not only are you my mentor but my friend and I want to affect my students the way Ms. Van Es affected me. A lot of her understanding of the importance of rhetoric and language comes from the summer after her sophomore year of college. A friend had introduced her to a program through the PCA that she could use to spend the summer abroad. So she spent the summer teaching English
First and foremost, Ms. Van Es is aware of the people around her. In 2013, she won the first ever Faculty Award for Inspirational Service given for going above and beyond expectations, personifying …show more content…
In her own words, “when you teach writing, there is a personal aspect in it; there’s a vulnerability involved and being a safe place for people to share their experiences has been a really rewarding thing for me.” Though she has only been at Northwestern College for twenty years, Ms. Van Es has been teaching writing for over thirty years in high schools and colleges combined. In addition, she loves teaching college writing because of the stage of life college students are at. However, she has a secret that a majority of her students wouldn’t be able to guess at. Public speaking is her worst fear. She has performance anxiety due to her perfectionistic side every time she speaks, whether that be in the classroom or for an event. For every class she taught, she would spend hours on an hour’s worth of class time. Which is why when her students and faculty put together a scrapbook for her this past spring, Ms. Van Es was very touched. One of the most heart-warming compliments she received was when a student wrote: Not only are you my mentor but my friend and I want to affect my students the way Ms. Van Es affected me. A lot of her understanding of the importance of rhetoric and language comes from the summer after her sophomore year of college. A friend had introduced her to a program through the PCA that she could use to spend the summer abroad. So she spent the summer teaching English