Isaiah Jobe-Winn Selected as Inaugural Resident Teacher on Assignment For Savannah State University

Isaiah Jobe-Winn with leadership from the Hyundai College of Education at Savannah State University

My final semester at Savannah State University gave me an experience I will carry with me for the rest of my life. In January 2026, I was selected as the first-ever resident teacher through a new partnership between the Savannah State University Hyundai College of Education and the Savannah-Chatham County Public School System. This opportunity that allowed me to complete my final semester of college while serving as a full-time, contracted teacher of record in the school system. I was placed at Andrea B. Williams Elementary School, where I had the privilege of becoming the fourth-grade English Language Arts teacher to an incredible group of students who would teach me just as much as I could ever teach them.

Before residency, I had spent years learning how to become a teacher. I had taken the courses, written the lesson plans, completed field experiences, studied instructional strategies, and learned about assessment, differentiation, classroom management, and child development. All of that preparation mattered, but walking into a classroom and realizing that these students were now my students changed everything. They were no longer names in a hypothetical lesson plan or students I was observing for a college assignment. They were real children with different personalities, interests, strengths, challenges, stories, and dreams, and every day I had the responsibility of giving them my best.

Over those months, I learned my students beyond what any data point could tell me. I learned who needed a little extra encouragement before they would raise their hand, who would make the entire class laugh, who needed to be challenged because they were capable of more than they realized, and who sometimes just needed someone to be patient with them. I learned what excited them, what frustrated them, and what helped them make sense of something that had not clicked before. Somewhere between the lessons, small groups, assessments, class conversations, celebrations, corrections, and everyday moments that make a classroom a classroom, those babies became my babies.

Of course, I was there to teach English Language Arts, and I took that responsibility seriously. I wanted my students to become stronger readers, writers, thinkers, and communicators. I wanted them to be able to explain their thinking, defend their ideas with evidence, ask good questions, and recognize that their voices mattered. Some of my favorite moments were watching a student finally understand something we had been working on or seeing the confidence on their face when they realized they could do something they initially believed was too difficult. Those moments reminded me that growth is not always immediate or perfectly linear, but when you spend every day with students, you get to see all of the little steps that eventually become something much bigger.

At the same time, they were teaching me. They taught me patience and flexibility in ways no textbook ever could. They taught me that the lesson I spent hours planning might need to change completely based on what they needed that morning. They taught me to listen more closely, to celebrate small victories, and to never underestimate how much students notice about the adults who serve them. Most importantly, they taught me that students need to know you genuinely care about them before anything else you are trying to accomplish together can fully take root.

There were certainly challenging days. I was learning how to be a teacher while still being a college student myself, and I did not get everything right. There were lessons I would teach differently today, decisions I learned from, and days when I went home thinking about what I could do better tomorrow. I was fortunate to have my principal, Dr. Tony Foy, my colleagues at A.B. Williams, and the faculty at Savannah State supporting me throughout an experience that was new for all of us. They gave me space to learn while never losing sight of the fact that my growth as an educator had to translate into something meaningful for the students sitting in front of me.

By the time May came around, I understood why teachers become so attached to their students. You spend months watching them grow, learning who they are, worrying about them, laughing with them, pushing them, celebrating them, and wanting so much for them. Then, eventually, the school year ends. I walked across the stage at Savannah State and earned my degree in Middle Grades Education, but some of the most important lessons from my final semester were not learned on a college campus. They came from a classroom full of fourth graders.

My career has taken me back to central office, but my students have never felt separate from the work I do now. Their drawings and notes were some of the first things I put up when I returned to an office because I wanted a visible reminder of who all of this work is ultimately supposed to serve. When the work gets complicated, when a system needs to be fixed, when a school needs support, or when a decision feels far removed from a classroom, I can picture the faces of the students who once sat in mine.

I am proud to have been Savannah State University’s first resident teacher, and I will always be grateful for the university and SCCPSS trusting me with that opportunity. But when I think about that semester, being “the first” is not what comes to mind first. I think about my students. I think about their personalities, their growth, the things they taught me, and how much I genuinely loved being their teacher.

They were my first students, my babies, and some of my greatest teachers. Wherever my career in public education takes me, they will always be among my reasons why.