Michelle Cummings: Leadership by example

All WF teachers have their own little super power; but Government and Economics teacher Michelle Cumming’s power can be described as unmatched. Not only is she an amazing teacher to her students inside the classroom but she’s also an amazing adviser for her students outside the classroom. Cummings is the head of the student body government and she handles this position as seriously and effectively as her teaching one. So it’s obvious what at least one of Cumming’s super powers is: Multi-tasking.

“Being a part of student government and being a part of Econ and Government, I get to work with students outside of the classroom,” Cummings said. “ Even in my classroom, I’m developing leaders.”

High school experience

What makes a person want to come back to high school? Well, having a good high school experience probably helps. Cummings attended high school in Ohio and she was a fourth generation student which means her parents and her grandparents attended the same high school. This means that there were teachers who knew her dad and her grandparents.

“It was a very close community, so I could never get in trouble,” Cummings said.

Cummings said she loved the teachers, though, because she loved learning. She even still emails one of her old teachers from her high school to share mock converse bills.

Why Gov and Econ?

Cummings' passion when she first started teaching was U.S. History. When she was working at South Florence High School, though, she was asked to teach AP Econ and well, the rest is history (pun intended).

“I really like Gov and Econ,” Cummings said. “I’ve taught every social study class offered…I kinda prefer gov and econ because it’s the seniors.”

Her teaching

“I think I just want someone who wants to learn,” Cummings said about her ideal student. “And wants to participate in sort of a way that makes them comfortable”

Cummings loves all her students. She doesn’t care if they’re loud or quiet as long as they want to learn. She loves watching all of her students grow between semester changes as well. Cummings not only likes watching her kids grow as students but as people too. She says she wants her students to leave her class as good humans. Cummings also said she would like to teach her students proper email etiquette.

“I think one of the best ways to be taken seriously,” Cummings said, “whatever you do, is to know how to send an email.”

One of her personal goals is to never stop learning and in the summer she is always looking for professional development opportunities so she can bring it back to the classroom. She would also like to get her doctorate in education.

Outside of school

Cummings is a huge reader outside of school. She said she read over a 100 books last year. She also has two Boykin spaniels which take a lot of energy and time. On her breaks she likes to go on trips to visit family and trips just with her husband. Cummings' husband, Andrew Cummings, also teaches social studies here at WF, as well as coaching the inaugural wrestling team. This means that Cummings also spends a lot of time at wrestling matches as well.

Spirit weeks

Cummings and the student body are who make the ideas for the spirit weeks. They both try very hard to think of days in which everyone can participate and that will be appropriate. It can be a hard and stressful job but Cummings gets her student body government and herself through it with her leadership skills.

“We want to include everybody,” said Cummings. “We want everybody to just be able to go into their closet and pull stuff out because to be super inclusive you need to make sure you're not only racially inclusive but also socially economically inclusive.”