Despite it being her first year at North, English teacher Amber Sims has already made a significant impact on her students.
Before coming to North, she taught for nine years at Arlington High School and two years at Elkhorn Middle School.
“I wanted to come to Elkhorn because this is where I live. I think that there’s a value of working and teaching students in your own community,” Sims said. “These students are representatives of the community in which I live and Elkhorn is a place that I am proud of and I am proud to be a part of. It’s so fun to work with these kids everyday.”
Sims grew up in Bellevue, Nebraska and was very involved in high school. She played volleyball, basketball, and ran track and cross country. She was also on the newspaper staff, which inspired her to become a teacher.
“I have a lot of teachers in my family which was actually why I considered not being a teacher just because it was so common in my family, but it was actually my newspaper advisor in high school who inspired me to be a teacher,” Sims explained. “She showed me how important it is to push people academically and to really see how influential education can be in someone’s life if you really push students not to settle but to get them to see their full potential.”
It is clear that she stands by this statement and encourages her students to be better every day.
“She always helps me through everything and she gives me really good advice on how to help with my writing. She always pushes us to make our writing better,” senior Madison Mclaughlin said. “Whenever I’m having a bad day, she’s always in a good mood and lightens up the room. She knows how to connect with her students. If I needed advice, I could go in and talk to her and she would gladly help me.”
Senior Kenzie Heedum agreed. “She is always super helpful. In class she walks around and talks to everyone to make sure we’re understanding what we are doing.”
Before her first teaching job, Sims went through undergraduate school at Concordia University in Seward, Nebraska where she majored in secondary education language arts. She also played basketball and ran track. Now, Sims is working to get her second master’s in school counseling from Lamar University in Texas.
“When getting a master’s while being a mom and working full time, free time is limited. So it does not happen a lot but I enjoy reading and my family loves to go camping and hiking. We love the outdoors and traveling as much as we can,” Sims said.
It is evident that the impressions Sims has on her students and Elkhorn North itself will only grow in years to continue.
