(upbeat music) All right, folks.

Jacqui Tricarico, the executive producer of Think Tank and Remember Them joining me down in Atlantic City for the NJEA, that's the New Jersey Education Association Convention.

Jacqui sat down with Christine Girtain from Toms River, a teacher there.

She is the New Jersey Teacher of the Year.

And here's Jacqui.

- Hi, I'm Jacqui Tricarico, on location at the NJEA Convention in Atlantic City, and so honored to be joined by Christine Girtain who is this year's NJEA State Teacher of the Year and a science teacher in Toms River.

It's so nice to meet you.

- It's nice to meet you.

- Thank you so much for taking the time to chat with us here at the convention.

Talk about your passion for science and STEM, and how that has evolved over the years, teaching for so many years in Toms River.

- Sure, I started off teaching biology and earth science, and I taught earth science for about 22 years.

And then I had the opportunity to learn about doing research with students, and I was the first research teacher at Toms River High School South.

And now, I teach research at both Toms River High School South and Toms River High School North.

When I get to speak with the students and really hear their interests, and then also get to expose them to possibilities that they don't even know are possible is really when you see that a-ha moment and you see them get excited about something new that they didn't know existed and that they didn't even know that they would like.

So for me, that is a powerful place to be, to be able to have that ability to open doors for them and to be able to give them more choices so that they can really experience who they can become.

- Your students, I've seen some video clips of them, especially after you won NJEA Teacher of the Year, talking about you.

They refer you as Mama G, right (laughs)?

- Yeah (laughs).

- And you could just tell how much they love you, and appreciate you, and respect you in the community.

How does that make you feel?

- It's great, it is.

And it's hard when they graduate, right?

Because they leave and they are my children, right?

But (laughs) it's a special, sorry, it's a special relationship with those kids because I teach them for three years, and when I taught earth science, I taught them for four years.

It was really special to teach my daughter's friends because she just graduated.

So that group of kids that graduated last year was amazing.

I knew some of them since kindergarten, and that's a bond that you don't usually have with individuals.

And I've had a lifetime with some of those kids.

They, you know, they call me when there's exciting things.

One of my students, Grace (indistinct), she's going to get her PhD, and she's originally from Nigeria.

So she got engaged and she messaged me and said, "You know, be prepared.

You're going to your first Nigerian wedding."

(Jacqui laughs) So those types of things - How fun.

and being able to share that with them, their lives and then also what they're becoming, you know, she's getting her PhD in psychology, and is going to herself, then, influence so many other people.

- I'm sure that just makes you so incredibly proud.

And having those students reach back out to you after graduation just shows how much you were dedicated to them and how much they wanna still involve you in their lives and their big moments.

It's so incredible.

Talk about too, creating opportunities for your students.

I know you've been able to do that in some really unique ways, including traveling to Costa Rica and Europe.

Can you talk about some of that?

- Sure.

So it's predicted that we'll run into a lot of antibiotic resistance by 2050, and working with Seeds of Change, which is a group that is working with the University of Wisconsin-Madison and then also the University of Costa Rica, we were able to bring 17 students, three of which were underserved students that were sponsored by a private funder, the Grunin Foundation, down to Costa Rica so that they could do hands-on research with leaf-cutter ants and the fungus that they farm.

The ants don't have any cases of antibiotic resistance and so, we're looking to them as a model and also looking to insects to be able to find new antibiotics to be able to, you know, offset disease not only in humans but also in crops and in livestock, because it's an issue as far as feeding and fueling the world in the future.

- Talk about feeding and fueling the world in the future.

I know you've said as teachers, it is part of your responsibility to make sure that your students' basic needs are met.

And during this time, you know, post-pandemic and during the pandemic, food insecurity was such a huge issue across New Jersey, across the nation.

How important is it to you to spread that message to make sure that teachers are looking past just the classroom, to make sure that your students are getting taken care of and helping them in those other areas of their life?

- Sure.

They can't learn if their basic necessities are not being provided for, and food is a necessity for life.

When you have students in your classroom that don't have that food, you can't concentrate, then, on homework or, you know, inspiring them to do some project that's after school because they haven't even eaten.

So addressing the food insecurity not only for our individual students but also in what is, like, causing that to happen, right?

Is it, you know, not having sustainable jobs, or not creating a sustainable workforce, or, you know, in the future, not having, you know, food being supplied.

We need to make sure that the students are learning that connection to their food, the high-tech and high-paying jobs that are in agriculture, because there's so much science involved in it.

And that was really new to me in the last two years and I got to connect with Nourish the Future, and then also a program called On the Farm.

So the National Corn Growers Association, the American Soybean Board, they both sponsor Nourish the Future.

And it educates teachers that aren't agricultural teachers to incorporate agricultural themes into their regular science classes, so that when you're teaching about antibiotic resistance students realize that there's diseases in crops and diseases in plants that they could be investigating and, you know, researching for their projects or even just to, you know, learn more about and have a connection to their food.

Most of us don't realize that popcorn's a whole separate plant than sweetcorn, especially in Jersey because we're the ninth largest producer of sweetcorn in the country.

And so when we see corn, you know, we think that's the corn on the cob that we're eating.

And sometimes it's popcorn growing in a field and sometimes it's, you know, field corn growing in a field.

I didn't know those things two years ago and if I don't know these things to pass on to my students, then they don't know them.

- And you touched upon job creation, job security, and just, job opportunity.

STEM being one of the several fields in our area in New Jersey, the tri-state area, where it can really give your students great opportunities for fantastic jobs after graduating high school and going on to college.

How important is that to you to spread that message, to get kids really engaged and excited about the STEM fields?

- I love that.

I love to teach them micropipetting and introduce them to biotechnology.

And we have large corporations in New Jersey that I would love to partner with to be able to reach more students and do more things across the state, so that we are, you know, building that sustainable pipeline of students that then stay in New Jersey for those biotech jobs.

I think that's super important.

- Yeah, great for the economy here in New Jersey and around our area.

And being named the NJEA State Teacher of the Year first, what was that like for you?

- It was crazy.

And I have to say I really wanted it.

I definitely, I wanted to have a voice.

I wanted to be able to speak with people like you and to be able to create change, right?

And be able to, just, not only make opportunities for the students that I teach, but for the other teachers that I teach with, you know, the county teachers of the year.

Those are great teachers that have all been recognized in each of their counties as superior educators.

And having them to work with, and being with that cohort, and being able to accomplish more across the state is pretty powerful.

So I really look forward to, like I said, having a voice and being able to make those networking connections so that, you know, our vision for education becomes more powerful when we work together.

- Beautifully said.

Thank you so much for taking the time to chat with us, and congratulations again on becoming the NJEA State Teacher of the Year this year.

- It's pretty cool.

I won't lie.

(both laughing) - Thank you so much, Christine.

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