Teachers to receive Excellence in Education Award

Sept. 27, 2007

The 11th Annual Bishop's Dinner for Catholic Education will celebrate Catholic schools and recognize four teachers for their excellence.

The teachers will receive The Bishop's Excellence in Education Award along with a $1,000 honorarium in recognition of their work in Catholic schools. The Oct. 21 dinner, at the Sioux City Convention Center, will feature CNN special correspondent Soledad O'Brien.

This year's recipients are Maxine Antoine of St. John the Baptist School, Bancroft; Mary Hunt of Spalding Catholic High School, Granville; Mary Renner of Gehlen Catholic, Le Mars; and Mary Uhl of Bishop Heelan Catholic Schools, Sioux City.

The Bishop's Excellence in Education Award was established in 1999 to recognize diocesan teachers who exemplify the teachings of Christ and excellence in education.

Recipients of this award must have been a teacher in the Diocese of Sioux City for at least five years. They are to have expressed a clear, integrated philosophy of Catholic education and be held in high regard by their peers, students and parents.

Maxine Antoine teaches fifth and sixth grade at St. John the Baptist Elementary School in Bancroft. She attended St. John the Baptist Grade School and St. John the Baptist High School. She graduated from Briar Cliff College (now University) in 1964 with a major in elementary education, minor in social studies and French. Antoine has taught for more than 40 years and has been at St. John's since 1988.

She said she chose to teach in a Catholic school "to help the children understand their faith and to become better persons and to learn to accept other people as they are."

"It helps me to understand my faith, to learn what you may have forgotten, to know more about how to live my faith and to better understand other people," said Antoine.

She and her husband James have three children, Maureen, Christian and Amy, all of whom attended St. John the Baptist School in Bancroft.

She credits her parents for influencing her to teach in a Catholic school, her mother especially, "because Catholic schools were very important."

"My mother always looked for the best in everyone. She set a good example of treating others well and living a life of prayer," said Antoine.

Mary (Kellen) Hunt is a math and computer teacher at Spalding High School in Granville. She attended Spalding Catholic Elementary School and High School and graduated from Briar Cliff University in 1987. She earned her master's of art in education degree at Morningside College in Sioux City. She has taught for 21 years at Spalding Catholic High School.

"It is a very family-like atmosphere where everyone supports each other through life's challenges," she said. "On a day-to-day basis you can teach how to live life in a faithful way full of values and morals. Through all of the years when you can see the success of your former students, you come to realize the importance of our roles as leaders of faith and knowledge."

She has four children, Justin, a graduate of Spalding High School; Katie, a senior at Spalding High School; Lucas and Mitchell, students at Spalding Catholic Elementary.

Hunt said that Janet Williams, her senior math and computer teacher, "who modeled extraordinary teaching skills" influenced her to teach in a Catholic school.

"My parents are my role model," she said. "Not only did they enroll my siblings and me in a K-12 Catholic school, they also encouraged us to attend a Catholic college as well."

Mary Renner is a fifth and sixth grade religion teacher, fifth grade math teacher and fifth grade homeroom teacher at Gehlen Catholic in Le Mars. The Kingsley native attended Kingsley-Pierson Community School and graduated from Briar Cliff University and University of Northern Iowa. She has taught fifth grade at Gehlen for 21 years. Before teaching at Gehlen, she owned and operated a preschool and day care for seven years.

"Teaching in a Catholic school has been so important to my faith because I have learned to deepen my relationship with God right along with each of the students I teach. I have learned so much about my spirituality. I truly feel blessed to be a Catholic because I can be a disciple of Christ through my teaching. I thank God for using me to teach others about him," she said.

She has two children, Chad and Rob, both graduates of Gehlen High School.

Renner credits her parents with influencing her to consider teaching at a Catholic school.

"I think that the greatest teacher of all, Christ, has to be the one role model that we should all try to exemplify," she said. "Also, there are so many people to thank for pushing me on to become the best I could be - my parents, of course; my principal, Lorie Nussbaum, for expecting more than 'good'; and also every student that I have taught in the last 21 years. I am what I am today because of all of you."

Mary (Donohue) Uhl is the kindergarten through eighth grade counselor for Bishop Heelan Catholic Schools in Sioux City. She attended Blessed Sacrament Elementary School and Heelan High School in Sioux City. She graduated from Briar Cliff and Wayne State College. She substitute taught in Catholic schools for 18 years before becoming a teacher at Holy Family School in Sioux City. She has been a counselor since 1997 for the Catholic elementary schools in Sioux City.

"I never thought to teach anywhere else. It is where faith and learning come together," she said. "I believe one of the obligations of an adult Catholic Christian is to pass on our Catholic faith and traditions. I find that the Catholic schools are an avenue to accomplish this."

She and her husband Gary have five children, Jeremy, Ted, Ben, Emily and Natalie, all of whom have graduated from Heelan High School.

"The teachers that I had were always so happy to be in the Catholic schools, so by their example I didn't ever think to teach anywhere else," said Uhl. "The experience of being in Catholic schools, as a student and as a parent, was awesome. I liked what I saw in the teachers, so I wanted to be a part of it."