Hatter nominated for Edwin Parr award by High Prairie School Division

Miller started his teaching career in a year like no class of teachers before after schools shut down in-person classes in March 2020 due to COVID-19.

Returning to in-person classes last September made it an uncertain time for teachers and students, but Miller kept one thing constant.

“What I tell the kids, what I reinforce is, ‘You know, go out and fail. It’s totally OK to fail, that’s how we grow. You, learn more from failing than anything. So go out and be a failure because you’re going to pull lessons from that, that you wouldn’t have got otherwise,’” Miller says. “And so for me, I try not to think of it as this crazy, insane year. And I’m just trying to promote to the kids that yes this is a crazy and insane year but just think of how much we’ve grown through it.”

Miller, who earned his teaching degree from the University of Lethbridge, went into the year with an open mind about how he could teach and slowly transitioned to the regular ensemble teaching when he could.

He also introduced boomwhackers to his band class. He says boomwhackers are typically an elementary school instrument but he was able to use them in later grades to teach music theory.

Outside the classroom setting, Miller struck partnerships with the local radio station that offered public performance opportunities to work for a government grant to provide workshops with local musicians to help kids.

He also put together an online Christmas concert. He says the Grade 7 students were especially upset at the idea of missing it.

“That’s the first concert where kids get to show what they’ve learned they were super bummed out thinking they were going to miss out. I told the kids, ‘no, no, no, no. Even though COVID’s here it’s not taking away my first concert so were doing an online concert,’” he says. “The kids were super jazzed they were super excited about it. They sent me videos and I edited them all together put them all together in a program and it came out really, really well.”

Miller says he’s honoured to be the division’s Edwin Parr nominee, but says he’s just doing what he loves.

“For me, it’s not the award but it’s what has preceded it and got us to this point. I’m kind of more focused on what I’ve done instead of actually getting the award,” he says. “It’s kind of just, this is what we’ve done and let’s show Alberta, let’s show Canada what we’ve done here at GPV (Georges P. Vanier).”

Miller also teaches Grade 7 and 8 science and high school drama and career and life management.

Prior to starting his teaching career, Miller worked at Sobeys for years. He gives kudos to his current and past peers and everyone on the frontlines for during the pandemic.

by Chris Brown

Hatter nominated for Edwin Parr award by High Prairie School Division

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