Creativity and compassion can be at a premium in the classroom, and longtime teacher Curtis Dawkins brings them into play on a regular basis in his role at North Aiken Elementary School.
Dawkins, a native of Gastonia, North Carolina, has been at North Aiken for 20 years, and is launching into his third decade with a fresh set of challenges, with the coronavirus pandemic touching classrooms and homes alike. First grade is his domain, and he normally faces a classroom of about 18 pupils from a student body of around 480 overall.
"I really love being with the kids," he said. "If you don't love being with the kids, you really shouldn't be there, because they come in as all different types of kids, with all different types of problems, and all different ways of having to teach them, and all different kinds of spirits."
Dawkins, whose background also includes teaching second grade for 11 years, added, "The most difficult thing is, at our school in particular, you have to find several different ways to teach the same type of lesson, because of the diversity in background, and because of the population that we have. You have to find a different way to teach the same thing. It's not a cookie-cutter approach."
Deanna Van Cleave, another of North Aiken's first-grade teachers, chose the phrase "extremely helpful" to begin her description of Dawkins. She added, "He loves the children, and he's very involved with their families. He's taught a lot of the parents, and so when it comes to knowing the community, he's very involved."
"The children really respect him, a lot of them love him a lot, because he's quick to give them hugs, and he's very quick to tell them that he loves them, and they need a positive role model," she said, noting that Dawkins is one of relatively few men in the building.
Dawkins' local admirers include Clifton Bush, a 2020 graduate of Aiken High School who had Dawkins as his second-grade teacher in 2007-08.
Read the full Aiken Standard article here.