Sandi Adair
English teacher Sandi Newbold Adair believes high school students can and should be expected to treat her and each other with dignity and respect while performing high quality academic work. “What I spend the most time on at the beginning of the year is getting my students to buy into my high standards and function with civility and manners,” she wrote for the Dallas Morning News. “And the good news is that they do, and sometimes they even exceed my expectations.”
Sandi has been chosen on of DMN’s Teacher Voices volunteer columnists, and her first contribution appeared Saturday.
Sandi grew up in Lake Highlands, the oldest of five daughters of John and Nancy.
“Coming from a ‘big’ family,” Sandi told me, “and with four younger sisters and an age-span of fifteen years between myself and the youngest, we were all at very different stages of life all the time, so we knew our roles and what was expected of us.”
“We were always taught manners, and to this day I really stress that with my own children and my students. I wasn’t the perfect teenager (just ask my mom), and it wasn’t until I became a parent that I set these high expectations for the young people around me.”
Nancy Newbold and Sandi Adair
“My biggest hero is my mother,” added Sandi.” I don’t know anyone and have never known or seen anyone do what she does, wear as many hats as she has and live her life as such a great example of service to others, first of all to her family. She is a woman of many talents and gives freely of her time to many people in her life. She is organized, creative, brilliant and beautiful.”
Sandi taught sophomore English at Lake Highlands High School from 1998-2005 (including back-to-back Toler sisters). She now teaches at McKinney North High School, where says she and her husband enjoy having room for sons 8 and 11 to roam outdoors.
“When I come to LH, of course it is to spend time with family, and I love to see the many forward changes that the community is making. There is always something going on in LH.”
“My favorite childhood memory of LH that stands out to me is probably going to the Audelia Library. Over the years, I have taken so many children there who I babysat in the community, and I love to see that it still has so many programs for kids.”
You can follow Sandi’s column online (behind the DMN paywall), and you can email her at adairsandi@yahoo.com.
