LONGWOOD, Fla. — When Vanessa Roth moved from out of state to Florida when she was in high school, she didn’t know anyone, but she says teachers made a difference in her life. One of those teachers inspired her to become a teacher.
Roth teaches fifth-graders math and science at Wekiva Elementary School in Longwood. It’s a career she adores. She says, “The thing that brings the most amount of joy is being able to teach in a community where we live and my children grow up. I get to see the neighborhood kids in the neighborhood. I get to see them at baseball games. I get to be a part of their life, just not inside of the classroom, but outside as well.”
Roth grew up in Pittsburg.
She says, “Moving here in high school was really hard. You know, as a ninth grader, I didn’t know anybody, and the teachers are what made a difference, and that was the moment that I knew that I wanted to be a teacher.”
Roth graduated from Seminole County Public Schools, which is why she wanted to teach in the school district.
All these years later, though, she never forgot one of those teachers who really impacted her. She says, “Mr. Scott French at Winter Springs High School in Seminole County Public Schools.”
Scott French is a math teacher.
Roth says there was something special about his teaching style. She adds, “He was the one that helped me with different strategies, different things, like the goose that we used in here, different things to help us remember math in a way that’s not just numbers.”
When Spectrum News reached out to French, he said, “Wow. I would never have known this. She was a great student.”
Teaching for about fifteen years now, Roth wants to have the same impact on her students that French had on her.
She wants her students to know that they were loved and cared for, and she wants them to remember her classroom. She adds, “It doesn’t have to be math, it doesn’t have to be science, maybe it’s a favorite song that we did or a favorite moment.”