By Owen Prusek

Receiving a faculty endowment award at Collegiate School is no easy feat; it takes dedication, a strong work ethic, enthusiasm in the classroom, and kindness toward all members of the community. After sitting down with the Lower School’s 4th Grade teacher Jamie Chambers, it became clear that she excels in all aspects of her teaching.

Chambers is in her 22nd year of teaching, with six of those at Collegiate, and she has already made an impact in the Collegiate community with the kindness and dedication that she brings into the classroom every day. As a Collegiate parent herself (Michael (‘26) and Nicholas (‘24)), she loves supporting her boys on the baseball field and in the classroom, keeping ties in the Upper School as well. In a 2024 Match article about visiting his mom’s classroom, Michael wrote, “My recent visit to Jamie Chambers’ 4th Grade classroom in the Lower School was an inspiring experience. As both a Collegiate student and the teacher’s son, I had the remarkable perspective of seeing my mom in action as an educator.”

Every spring and fall, during faculty professional days at the start and close of the school year, Collegiate takes the time to recognize select teachers from the Lower, Middle, and Upper Schools to congratulate them for their excellence and commitment to education.

This past August, Chambers received the Lower School Craigie Endowment for Teaching Excellence Award. According to Collegiate’s website, the award was “established in 1996 by the family of Beese Craigie, a former 4th Grade teacher and Board Chair at Collegiate.” The “fund rewards a Lower School teacher who exemplifies the values and ideals of teaching at Collegiate.”

The environment in Chambers’ 4th Grade class is a perfect example of this. Small group stations, with engaging lesson plans that she makes herself, are a part of why her students love coming to class every day with an open mind, ready to learn.

Left to right: Chambers, Head of Lower School Khristi Bates, Lower School Literacy Specialist & Coach Kristin Tujuba. Tujuba won the Hamill Award, given to a teacher annually for embodying the teacher-coach-mentor model. Photo courtesy of Collegiate School.

In a recent interview, I asked Chambers about the roles she plays in the Lower School and the award. As a 4th Grade teacher, Chambers is also involved in being a Grade Team Leader, Co-Sponsor of the Lower School recycling team, and has also led the Envision Collegiate Capstone program for the past five years. Chambers is a steady presence with her students and colleagues, and her teaching is rooted in purpose and vision.

According to Collegiate’s website, the Lower School Capstone program “allows the 4th Grade students to connect with people and programs across the Collegiate campus to foster a deeper understanding of the Collegiate community and to identify opportunities for growth and change. The students also travel off campus to local organizations and businesses for additional learning and inspiration.” With a focus on improving sustainability, the students are challenged to think deeper about solutions that would help improve the school.

Chambers keeps her students engaged and ready to learn each day, and her small group teaching and hands-on activities are perfect for 4th Grade students. I saw an example of incorporating arts and crafts into a lesson the students were learning.

Receiving this award was an accomplishment for Chambers, seeing that her motivation to create a better Collegiate community in her classroom has not gone unnoticed. The way that she ignites love of learning, one of Collegiate’s most important values, in all the people she connects with is truly something special.

As stated in the announcement about that accompanied the award, “Whether she’s guiding students through imaginative writing adventures, championing sustainability, or mentoring colleagues with grace, Jamie is a powerhouse of creativity and innovation.”