French teacher Samantha Godden-Chmielowicz has expanded the global language skills of students at Carl Schurz High School in Chicago. Her innovative, hands-on strategies have included collaborating with colleagues to support French, Spanish, and Italian Honor Societies, and the World Language Department Film Fest. Her students participated in the field test for the Illinois State Seal of Biliteracy, which is now district-wide in Chicago Public Schools. Godden-Chmielowicz's contributions to the world language program have improved reading, language and vocabulary schoolwide, not only in foreign languages, but in other subjects as well. A National Board Certified teacher, Godden-Chmielowicz has mentored several National Board Certification candidates as well as new teachers. She has been chair of the world language department at Schurz since 2005, and previously taught and was Chair at William Rainey Harper High School, where she revived the French program. Godden-Chmielowicz has served on the executive council of the Chicago/Northern Illinois chapter of the American Association of Teachers of French (AATF), the Board of Directors of the Illinois Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ICTFL), and the Board of the Central States Conference on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (CSCTFL).
1993 Marquette University, B.A.
