By Anne Halliwell

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The people who spend the most time in classrooms after graduation spend much of their college career out of university classrooms.

Chelsea Kauffeld, a middle school education senior, has spent her last 16 weeks student-teaching eighth- graders at Morton Middle School.

“I feel like I’m already grown up and have a job,” Kauffeld said. “(But) I can’t be upset about it because I love what I do.”

Because she works on campus, Kauffeld said she’s not completely disconnected from UK. All of the credit Kauffeld is earning this semester is outside of college and inside the middle school classroom.

Teacher education is structured so that student teaching is the culminating experience, said Sharon Brennan of Education Curriculum and Instruction.

Kauffeld chose middle school education partially because it would allow her to choose two areas in which to teach: science and language arts.

Kauffeld’s current placement focuses on language, and she has already undergone an eight-week run last fall, which focused on science.

“I kind of thought I wanted to be a teacher,” Kauffeld said. “Science was what I was good at but language arts was what I loved.”

Kauffeld has been matched with Retta Kelley, an eighth-grade language arts teacher at Morton Middle School.

“She is an awesome teacher and an even better person to learn from,” Kauffeld said. “She lets me fail and figure things out … she lets me learn, which is the best thing.”

Kauffeld and Kelley had worked together during the former’s practicum, and so the UK placement office allowed them to work together again, Kelley wrote in an email.

“Chelsea has been a fantastic student teacher,” Kelley wrote in the email. “She is a naturally gifted teacher who has great rapport with the students and plans really engaging lessons.”

UK placed Kauffeld with Kelley after searching for teachers working in language arts in Fayette County, Kauffeld said.

UK takes the students’ preferred age range and subjects into account, Brennan said, but also looks for places where a student will be challenged and able to handle a variety of teaching situations.

Brennan pointed out that first graders and fifth graders will be handled entirely differently, and so UK has to consider the students’ experience carefully.

Undergraduate students earn 12 credit hours for all-day teaching 5 days per week, Brennan said, but many students will take another course online or after traditional school hours end.

Kauffeld is taking an online course this semester and took two night courses in the fall, but said it was hard to take classes after teaching all day. She called student teaching the most valuable experience she could have, but also compared it to taking a job for which she is not paid.

An observer comes to evaluate student-teachers’ progress four times during each 16-week placement, Kauffeld said.

“That is always something that is nerve-wracking … you need to remind yourself that … the criticism that I get is so I’ll be a better teacher for the kids,” Kauffeld said.

Brennan said students are assessed based on their work in the classroom and observations made.

“(Student teachers) need to interact positively with all types of students and be willing to learn and jump right into the classroom,” Kelley wrote in the email.

Despite the downsides of being away from campus, Kauffeld said the children make spending second semester teaching worth it.

“Especially the middle schoolers, they’re so dynamic- some days they’re the funniest people I know, sometimes they’re the most honest, which is scary,” Kauffeld said. “The relationships you form with these kids are incredible.”