This will be English teacher Jean Abercrombie’s last year to teach at Randall.

Despite recent rumors that state budget cuts are forcing retirement on certain teachers, Abercrombie said she will be leaving, reluctantly, but ultimately by choice. After 22 years of Raider pride the time to “throw in the towel” has come.

“I’m very sad to be leaving,” Abercrombie said. “I love it here. All last year I kept thinking ‘it’s the last time, it’s the last time’ and now, it really is. If I were to leave tomorrow, I would probably spend today cleaning my room in a hurry. That would be my biggest worry. Of course, I will miss my friends and my students. It’ll just be sad.”

Abercrombie has spent her teaching years being an ambassador for both students and the education profession. However, she said she will still leave wishing she could make changes to better the system.

“If politicians were to talk to real teachers, not other politicians, I would have a lot to say,” Abercrombie said. “I would get rid of mandated testing because teaching kids for one test all year long will not produce well-educated, well-rounded thinkers. They want us all to teach the same way, it’s all generic and takes away the creativity.”

Abercrombie also shared an inspiring story of how she got her start in education.

“I was a welfare kid,” Abercrombie said. “I never would’ve gone to college if it weren’t for this one teacher I had. His name was Virgil Francis [and] he literally changed my life. In the summer, he took me to Southwestern Oklahoma with a job scholarship and $10 for a dorm and said ‘Be a good teacher’. I cried because I wanted to be a teacher since first grade. I graduated college. No one in my family even went to college before me. If he were still alive today I would tell him ‘I did this because of you, I remembered what you said’.”

It is encouraging words like the ones Francis spoke that Abercrombie said have kept her going. She continues to carry on through her last year with a smile and she said she hopes to pass on her own words of wisdom to her students.

“Find your passion,” she said. “Life isn’t just about making money. My passion is English and kids. I love my job and my students—I learn from them. That’s why I do what I do. I just hope they find their passion one day like I have.”