Page 6 THE VILLADOM TIMES IV • February 24, 2010 Area Maryann Woods-Murphy is NJEA’s Teacher of the Year by John Koster Maryann Woods-Murphy, a founding teacher at the Bergen Academies and now the Spanish teacher at Northern Highlands Regional High School in Allendale, has been named 2010 Teacher of the Year by the New Jersey Education Association. She will be featured on Classroom Close-Up, NJ, on Feb. 27, March 29, and April 3. Woods-Murphy learned Spanish the total-immersion way when she and her husband moved to Spain after she graduated from Montclair State College. She said she adapted to her new home in Spain by speaking only Spanish to her husband Joe and to the rest of the people around her. She achieved fluency within three to six months. She was able to obtain a job teaching English, and enrolled in the University of Salamanca. When she and her husband returned to the United States, they started a business, opening the Bergen County Language Institute in 1984. Her daughter Malynda and her son Joseph were born, and Woods-Murphy qualified for her teacher’s certificate and taught at New York middle schools and high schools before becoming a founding teacher at the Bergen Academies in Hackensack. Woods-Murphy joined the staff of Northern Highlands Regional High School in 2003. At Highlands, she works to stimulate a community environment in her classroom, one where students feel safe to take risks and to take their abilities with the language out of the classroom. She has arranged 26 trips abroad for students and colleagues, and organized a Martin Luther King Day of Service at the high school. The school was closed for the day, but more than 80 students offered their services for the day at homeless shelters. As New Jersey Teacher of the Year, Woods-Murphy will participate in a half-year sabbatical sponsored by the Educational Testing Service through June of 2010, traveling around the state in a car rented for her by the sponsoring organization. Her husband is chairman of the ethics program at Dwight Englewood School. Her daughter is a Spanish teacher at the Emil Cavallini Middle School in Upper Saddle River, and her son is studying Spanish and kinesiology at Temple University. Moving up Nicholas Tredici of Ramsey, a student at Tiger Schulmann’s Karate, recently earned his Red Belt. He is pictured with Sensei Rapoport after his achievement. COSMETIC VEIN CENTER, LLC Medical Day Spa ������������������������� ������������������������ ������������� ������������������ • Microdermabrasion • Facials • Chemical Peels Luba • Teen & Adult Acne Control • Eyebrow Design & Eye Lash Tint • Body Waxing (including Brazilian Bikini) 265 Ackerman Avenue, Suite 203, Ridgewood • 201-445-8820 Sunday, March 7th 2-4pm 6-13 yrs. Camp Pamacka 3-6 yrs. Y‛s Kidz Camp • refreshments & prizes • camp activities & registration FREE! just let us know you‛re coming 201-444-5600 x339 YMCA DAY CAMP OPEN HOUSE www.ridgewoodymca.org RIDGEWOOD YMCA 112 OAK STREET ®