Pam Cannon loves her job, so receiving a regional award was just an added bonus for her.
Cannon received the Kansas MVAEA Achievement Award at the Missouri Valley Adult Education (MVAEA) Association in Kansas City June 4.
“It was a tremendous honor,” she said. “It was totally unexpected.”
Cannon works at the Butler Adult Education Center. She was acknowledged for elevating Kansas Adult Education’s academic standards through her involvement in designing and teaching the Butler PASS (Pathways to Achieving Student Success) class while helping students transition to postsecondary education/training.
“I just do my job and I do things to try to help the students learn and apply what they are learning to life,” she said. “I care about them and I try to do what I can to help them achieve the goals they have set for themselves.”
Cannon was one of seven nominees for the award.
Each of the seven states of MVAEA have an opportunity during the annual regional conference to recognize a person who has made outstanding contributions in strengthening adult education programming in their state. This is one MVAEA award that recognizes individuals who have been professionally active in the field of adult and continuing education.
Cannon was nominated by the Kansas Adult Education Association Board.
She will have worked there for seven years in September.
She started off teaching fast track.
“What I’ve enjoyed most is seeing students achieve their goals,” Cannon said. “Students who didn’t believe they could achieve or have been told they couldn’t be successful – to see their faces light up when they are successful academically at what they are doing. That is my greatest reward.”
She also enjoys seeing them go on to college.
“When I met them, all they wanted was a high school diploma,” she explained.
But after even just a week with Cannon, the students start asking about post secondary schools.
“When I start classes, I tell them, ‘you’re here. The high school diploma is a given. What are you going to do after high school.’ It gets them thinking.”
Now, in the PASS classes, Cannon works with students who have already decided they want to go on to attain additional education.
“It’s working with an entirely new group of students who already know what they want and helping them get there,” she said. “I love working with the students and seeing them achieve their goals.
“This award was just recognizing all the things I do I thought people didn’t notice.”
El Dorado, Kan. —
