Cayleb Underhill is a 19-year-old paraprofessional in the Cottonwood-Oak Creek School District’s Primary Intervention Program who is part of a cohort of teachers trained by the Valley Academy of Career and Technology Education to fill the need for teachers in rural Arizona by training local junior and senior high school students to be teachers.
The teacher training program is taught by Genna Adams; participants can earn up to 18 credit hours from Yavapai College through dual enrollment. Eventually they are placed in a classroom for four days a week, three hours a day under the supervision of a “master Teacher.”
VACTE currently offers several dual-enrollment programs with Yavapai College, including law enforcement, nursing and culinary arts.
“My mentor teacher is the one who threw me out into the water, who got me to find this passion,” Underhill said. “I joined this CTE class not knowing what I wanted out of it. Butshe helped guide me and she showed me opportunities.I took the opportunities and that helped the snowball effect into teaching now. I went from a kid who didn’t want much out of life who was okay being a YouTuber living in his parent’s garage … I went from that to having an outdoor hobby, having a career and a passion.”
“The program really didn’t really take hold until [Adams] became a leader, and now she’s had 30 kids in the program [in the] last two years,” Cottonwood- Oak Creek School District Superintendent Steve King said. “Two of them are currently working in [COCSD] … and that’s what we’re looking for, people who really want to go out and make a difference in the world through education and teaching.” Underhill began working with first- through fourth graders as a paraprofessional two days before he graduated from Mingus Union High School.
“I chose a tough program so I can be a tough teacher in the future,” Underhill said.
“These are children who have trouble self regulating and the idea of the program is to teach them how to build those skills and get those needs met. Underhill said
that he enjoys seeing students make progress, especially milestone moments when a lesson finally clicks. It’s also what made him choose to devote himself to education.
“It was an experience in his practicum, connecting with a little girl that couldn’t understand the math,” Adams said. “Heactually asked his mentor teacher, ‘Can I come back after school?’ which he did on his own time, he went back and helped her and came [back] through the door and said, ‘This is what I want to do.’”
Those moments of lifting others up is what Underhill said makes him want to show up to work daily.
“I had a rough childhood,” Underhill said. “I have been through two divorces. [But] I had those teachers who were there, who supported me, they gave me a safe classroom. Everything was the same and that meant a lot. It seems small but knowing you could walk in and you have a safe environment is nice. Your teachers are always going to treat you the same as if nothing’s wrong, nothing’s going on at home. That’s a secure feeling that teachers provide, that’s what I want to do.”
Underhill is roughly halfway done with an associate’s degree in early childhood education at Yavapai College and plans to enroll at Northern Arizona University or Grand Canyon University afterward, “preferably somewhere with a hybrid model because I want to still be able to teach during the day and stay in the district I’m in. Because I enjoy it here,” he said.
“What separates Cayleb from some of the others is every opportunity I put in front of him, every door, I nudged open, he went through it, and he was resilient,” Adams said. “[There’s] a lot of risk taking in the program, because it’s not easy to get up in front of people and compete or teach lessons.”
Underhill also is a state champion in a TED Talkstyle competition run by Educators Rising, a national network supporting professional development for educators. He was among a group of students who competed at the Educators Rising national conference from June 29 through July 2 in Orlando, Florida.
“I did my talk on the power of being there with students because COVID really [affected] education,” Underhill said. “My talk was how to boost connectivity in schools, which I based on my experiences working with children. Just being in the classroom and being connected with others keeps kids engaged. I also based [it] on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Eventually your love and belonging needs are more important than your esteem needs. And once they have the love and belongingness from those connections in the classroom, they want education.”
“He also was our opening day speaker for [COCSD],” Adams said. “He did a 12-minute speech on how he became inspired to become a teacher. I had several teachers come up to me and say, ‘That’s all we needed that day was to hear what he had to say.’ Because he’s the real deal because of what he experienced. You don’t get that without the practicum and hands-on experience. The students in his classroom thrived under his mentorship. He [is] highly respected on the whole campus.”
