Northfield Middle School teacher Mary Corrigan (left), who was named one of America's ten best teachers by the nationally syndicated TV show "Regis & Kelly", shows her friend Pam Stoddard some pictures from this year's school Spring Musical. Pam was the person who started the award nomination process when she called the show after seeing the award mentioned on TV last month. Photo by Bill Croney, The Northfield News A Northfield Middle High School teacher was named as one of the nation’s top ten teachers by a national TV show.

MaryCorrigan, who has been teaching in Northfield since 1977, was named to the top ten list in the “Regis & Kelly Teacher of The Year” contest.

Mrs. Corrigan was very low key about the award and in her usual modest and self effacing manner she credited the people she teaches with as being just as deserving of the award.

Pam Stoddard, a retired teacher who worked with Mary for several years, was the person who started the process.

“Since I retired a few tears ago I occasionally watch a morning TV show. And in the middle of March I saw them announce the contest. I immediately thought of Mary. It was almost instantaneous, I’ve got this in my head. I’ve got to tell them about Mary. March 30th I wrote the letter. It sounds like a cliché’ but it was the easiest letter I have written.

The show got back to me and I gave them some names to contact. They did their homework . They talked to Peter Evans the Principal at Montpelier. He was the Principal here when the auditorium was named after Mary. I think he had a lot to do with it. They called around to a lot of people.” Pam Stoddard said.

The announcement from the “Regis & Kelly “ show was scheduled for Friday, April 30 but Pam found out the day before. “We wanted to make it special for Mary,” Pam said. She was instrumental in contacting Mary’s children and they arranged to get Mary’s 85 year old parents to Northfield for the surprise of the announcement.

The Northfield High Principal, Tom McKone, really set things up nicely. “We had a fire Drill scheduled for that day so We scheduled it so we could bring the classes to the auditorium. We had the show taped in the Elementary School library and Jim Jones was charged with getting the tape to the auditorium and set up by the time the kids got back in.

Every body was curious as to just what was going on but I kept telling them ‘don’t worry, you’ll like it’,” Mr. McKone said.

When the students went to their assigned places in the auditorium Mary Corrigan’s seventh grade class was in their usual place up in the high seats waiting to see what was going to happen. After everyone was in place Mr. McKone made the announcement . “In our audience today is someone who, just a few minutes, ago was named by a major television show as a finalist in the National Teacher of The Year award. Now we’re going to show you that clip,” he said.

“They first named another town and paused and announced that teacher’s name,” said Pam Stoddard. Mary was the third teacher named. “When they said Northfield, Vermont I never heard such a noise. When her picture came up Mary never heard her mane, the kids just screamed and screamed, I have never seen kids react that way. I mean we have polite kids, nice kids, This (the kid’s reaction) was from the heart,” Pam said.

Mary, to say the least, was stunned. She had absolutely no clue that this was coming. After the initial shock she knew she had to do something other than just sit there. “I knew I had to stand up and acknowledge this wonderful outpouring of emotion, And when I stood up I saw my son coming up the stairs and I asked him ‘what are you

doing here?,’ Mary said. And that’s when the rest of it started. Mary went down to the podium and met two of her three children and her parents who helped ed her celebrate both the award and the surprise.

“It was a shock, a wonderful shock.

But perhaps one of the best parts of all this is that I have been contacted by students that I taught from forever ago have contacted me. They do that whole facebook thing.

I’m not on facebook but my daughter is and she sends the messages to me. Many people have reappeared and that’s been fun” said Mary.

Pam Stoddard thought that Mary’s interaction with her students was the main reason she is deserving of the award. “Mary is a very special kind of teacher. She has a unique combination of loving the kids but getting the absolute most out of them. She has a talent for breaking down a lesson or skill into its smallest parts so the kids can grasp it. I think it’s wonderful that it happens year after year after year,” Pam said.

All in all it was a very impressive Friday for Mary Corrigan. Receiving a National award in the auditorium that bears her name.