Dr. Senita Walker, now retired, was previously the vocational education director at Moss Point High School in Moss Point, and director of the Gulf Coast Master Teacher Mentoring Project in Long Beach. "I teach students that I am still learning; that I, too, make mistakes; and that no one knows everything," said Dr. Walker. Formerly a librarian for Woodley Elementary School in Hattiesburg following a decade of teaching gifted students, Dr. Walker helped students with reading difficulties by implementing an individualized reading program that incorporated recorded books. As school librarian, she taught research skills to all students, as well as the use of CD-ROMs and the Internet. Dr. Walker implemented a word processing program that allowed students to edit their own work and resulted in a marked improvement in their writing ability and confidence level. In 1995, Walker became the first elementary school teacher in Mississippi to be certified by the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards.
