Missouri’s 56th Teacher of the Year is a high school English teacher from the Kansas City area. A selection committee of peers and education partners across the state has chosen Lee’s Summit West High School English teacher Jennifer Jones for the top educator award.
Jones has been a teacher at Lee’s Summit West High School for the last 19 years of her 23-year career.
“In my best moments as a teacher, the students function nearly independently from me, relying instead on each other and their own thinking to solve the complex and important challenges inherent in writing and reading,” said Jones. “In order for students to stretch their high school brains toward college thinking, they must work together; in order to work together, they must feel connected to the classroom community.”
Missouri 2025 Teacher of the Year Jennifer Jones (Photo provided by the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education)
Jones teaches senior College Credit English and International Baccalaureate English Literature and serves as the language arts department co-chair. She says she focuses on building community and fostering critical thinking in her classroom daily.
“Missouri is fortunate to have so many passionate, dedicated educators, and Jennifer is a wonderful example of the best of our teacher workforce,” said Commissioner of Education Karla Eslinger. “Every day Jennifer demonstrates just how important it is to foster a life-long love of learning in both our students and our educators. And she’s committed not just to students’ academic success, but how they develop as people and future leaders.”
Jones will be honored during the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education’s Teacher of the Year recognition event at Lake of the Ozarks on Monday, October 21, along with the other finalists, semi-finalists, and Regional Teachers of the Year. Jones will move on to serve as Missouri’s representative in the National Teacher of the Year program.
The Teacher of the Year program has been around since 1957 to recognize the efforts of effective teachers who work to provide a high-quality education to their students.
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