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	Last updated 6.15.05

The NEA Foundation Award for Teaching Excellence

2001 Finalist and Recipient of The Horace Mannö
NEA Foundation Award for Teaching Excellence

David Ely
Vermont—NEA

David "Dave" Ely is a science teacher at Champlain Valley Union High School in Hinesburg, Vermont, where he has worked for the past 28 years. This year he will teach human biology, Advanced Placement biology, and biotechnology.

Mr. Ely has made many contributions to his field. He is a past president of the Vermont Science Teachers Association, and currently serves on the Committee for Advanced Study in Mathematics and Science in American High Schools sponsored by the National Academy of Sciences. He also spent six years helping the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards develop standards and assessment tools in the area of adolescent and young adult science. Such activities, he feels, add to his performance in the classroom: "I believe that professional development is very important in teaching . . . It is a source of the energy that sustains you. Collegiality is a part of that."

Mr. Ely draws heavily on his own background in relating to students. As one of eighteen children from a poor, rural family, he knows that geographic and socioeconomic differences can be as important to learning as differences of race or ethnicity, religion, gender, or sexual orientation. "I create learning opportunities in which kids are encouraged to accept diversity in the same way that nature accepts and promotes it. Systems, including plant, animal, and humans, are much stronger when based in diversity rather than in homogeneity." In his classroom, the concept of diversity also includes a wide range of learning styles and abilities. Mr. Ely has engaged in extensive professional development focused on children with physical and learning disabilities, and helped others in his department to better serve these students. He also routinely encourages average and struggling students to enroll in Advanced Placement courses, with great success.

Mr. Ely has served as president, vice-president, and executive board member of his local National Education Association affiliate, currently the Chittenden South Education Association. He has been a negotiator, grievance representative, and delegate to the Representative Assemblies of the Vermont-NEA and the National Education Association.

Angelo Dorta, the president of Vermont-NEA, cites Mr. Ely's "profound devotion to students and unrelenting commitment to teacher professionalism" as hallmarks of his career. "[Ely] has consistently sought high quality professional development experiences . . . that deepen and enrich his own content knowledge and that can be adapted and applied in the classroom to enhance student learning," Dorta continued in his letter of nomination for the Award for Teaching Excellence. "His tireless leadership has strengthened the profession of teaching at the local, state, and national levels."

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