Indianapolis Public Schools Celebrate Tina Ahlgren '05 as 'Teacher of the Year'

June 7, 2014

"Tina, we salute you," said Lewis Ferebee, superintendent of Indianapolis Public Schools, as he named Tina Ahlgren the IPS "Teacher of the Year" yesterday.  Ahlgren, a math teacher at Shortridge Magnet High School for Law and Public Policy, is a 2005 graduate of DePauw University. "You represent the entire IPS family well," Ferebee added. (Ahlgren at Friday's ceremony/Star photo by Robert Scheer)

"I really make an effort to build positive relationships with my students," Ahlgren tells the Indianapolis Star, "and that's how I get through to them and motivate them to do what I ask and be successful in my classroom."

Stephanie Wang writes, "A DePauw University graduate, Ahlgren has been teaching in IPS schools for nine years. These are kids, she says, who have been let down in their personal lives -- and then have to face the scary subject of math and put themselves at risk of failure in the classroom."

The piece notes, "Ahlgren, still on maternity leave, didn't even really need to be at school for Friday's day of service. But this is a teacher who rushed to the hospital to be by the side of a student giving birth. This is a teacher who encouraged a student to keep up with schoolwork when he was in juvenile jail. This is a teacher who brought homework to a student recovering from being shot. So the surprise wasn't that Ahlgren, a Shortridge Magnet High School math teacher, showed up Friday, 12-week-old baby in tow, to help students clean up trash around the neighborhood. The surprise came when Indianapolis Public Schools honored her in front of an auditorium of cheering students as the district's Teacher of the Year."

You'll find the complete article at IndyStar.com.

Last week, Tina (Flispart) Ahlgren won the Hubbard Life-Changing Teacher Award, detailed here. She majored in mathematics at DePauw where she was a Rector Scholar.

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