Finalists for 2028 SCCPSS Teacher and Instructional Support Person of the Year Named

Five finalists each for two of the Savannah-Chatham County Public School System’s highest honors were announced at a reception on Wednesday, October 21, 2026 in the Jenkins High School Auditorium. The announcement of finalists for the District’s 2028 Teacher of the Year and Instructional Support Person of the Year came after each of the school level representatives submitted from 59 district schools and programs were recognized and crossed stage to shake hands with Board members and the Superintendent. WJCL News Anchor Shannon Royster was the event emcee.

All ten finalists are pictured in the photo above with Board members and the Superintendent.  The five finalists for our 2028 District Teacher of the Year are:

Andrea Hall-Houston – Woodville-Tompkins Technical & Career High School

Katherine Bernard – Georgetown K-8 School

Jared Hall – Esther F. Garrison School for the Arts

Vanessa Stultz – Sarah Mills Hodge Elementary School

Nouline Sherman-Williams – Windsor Forest Elementary School

The five finalists for our 2028 District Instructional Support Person of the Year are:

Leslie Walker – Building Bridges High School Academy

Michael Barth – Windsor Forest High School

Kimberly Crawford – Savannah-Chatham E-Learning Academy

Jennifer West – Esther F. Garrison School for the Arts

Olivia Lee-Taft – New Hampstead High School

The Teacher of the Year finalists were determined by scores from Community Readers of each teacher’s essay application submitted after they were chosen by their peers to be the Teacher of the Year for their school. The Teacher of the Year application is based on the State Teacher of the Year application.

Each year the Savannah-Chatham County Public School System recognizes support staff such as nurses, paraprofessionals, custodians, cafeteria workers, counselor clerks, secretaries and school resource officers.  Each school chooses a site-based representative who then competes to be named the District’s Instructional Support Person of the Year. The Instructional Support Person of the Year finalists were based on scoring of their District applications by readers from within the district.

The 2028 District Teacher of the Year (TOTY) and Instructional Support Person of the Year (ISPY) will be named at the Annual Excellence in Education Gala set for February 12, 2027. They will then serve as leaders for the Superintendent’s Professional Senate in the 2027-28 School Year, providing updates during monthly School Board Meetings and acting as an advocate for the school system.

The five finalists for Teacher of the Year will now move on to the next steps in competition to name the District Teacher of the Year for the 2027-28 School Year.  That process includes classroom observations and panel interviews over the next month.

See more photos from the event here.