By Jo Matthis / AAPS
Serena Kessler grew up in western New York, the daughter of a college professor and a corporate trainer. At Allegheny College in Pennsylvania, she majored in English and history and ran cross country and track. After college, she moved to Ann Arbor to earn a master’s in education at the University of Michigan.
She first fell in love with Ann Arbor and then later with a Michigan boy whom she married. That was 30 years ago. She’s been here ever since and has worked at Skyline High School for eight years after spending the first 20 years of her career teaching at Romulus High School.
Kessler and her husband, Mike, have two children, Hobbs and Natalie.
Skyline Principal Casey Elmore says Kessler is an amazing teacher who cultivates community and student voice in her classroom.
“She challenges students while providing the needed support to ensure their success,” she says. “She is also a cross country coach at Skyline and lends her athletic and leadership skills to our students in athletics. We are lucky to have Serena as a part of our Skyline family.”
Q: What inspired you to become an English teacher?
A: The short and most honest answer is books. I love them and wanted a job that allowed me to share my love for them in some way. That’s what got me started, anyway. But what has kept me in it is the young people I get to work with every day. It’s meaningful work — engaging minds.
Q: How do you keep your high school English classes engaging and relevant for your students?
A: We talk in the English teacher world of books being mirrors, windows, and sliding glass doors, a metaphor coined by writer Rudine Sims Bishop, so one way to engage kids is to work with the books that both reflect their experiences and open up their worlds and their imaginations. We are so lucky at Skyline to have librarians who have their fingers on the pulse and are masters of matching kids with books. The students I teach are also incredible writers and storytellers, so in our writing workshops, we share a lot of writing and celebrate the magic of language. That can be both engaging and joyful.
Q: As Skyline’s cross country and track coach, what do you enjoy most about working with student athletes?
A: It’s incredibly satisfying in both athletics and academics to witness the growth that comes from pushing comfort zones, practicing a craft consistently, getting support from teammates and classmates, and achieving goals. There’s no better feeling than watching a young person accomplish something they did not even know was possible, and knowing that I played a role in it.
Q: How do you balance the demands of teaching and coaching? What strategies do you use to manage your time and energy effectively?
A: I’m still figuring this one out. It’s challenging, and I’m not sure I could do it if my family wasn’t involved. I didn’t start coaching until both of my kids were in the program at Skyline and my husband was coaching too. So, if we spent 10 hours at a track meet on Saturday, I didn’t feel like I was missing out on time with my family when I spent all day Sunday doing schoolwork to prepare for the week ahead. I’ve spent 29 years trying to figure out how to do this job most efficiently, and have ultimately come to the conclusion that while there are certainly little things that can be done to maximize time, the reality of this work is that it requires a lot of time and emotional energy, but it’s meaningful work, so that is time and energy well-
spent.
Q: How do you encourage your students to develop their writing and critical thinking skills? How is Artificial Intelligence affecting that?
A: In my classroom, we focus on the process, not the final product. We write every day, learning from and being inspired by mentor texts. We read like writers, paying close attention to the moves that good writers make, trying them out ourselves, and taking risks.
The ultimate goal is to develop authentic voices and styles, to use writing to help discover what we think and believe, not to just complete perfectly polished assignments. I’ve been experimenting with using AI as a tool for developing writers, but there is a lot still to figure out. One thing I’ve tried is using Chat Gpt in the revision and editing process. I’ll have students ask it for feedback on their writing and then we evaluate how useful that feedback is.
Q: What is your all-time favorite book?
A: My current favorite book is Tomorrow, Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin. That will likely change when the next great one comes around.
Q: What podcasts do you listen to, either for professional development or personal interest?
A: One of my favorite podcasts is “Normal Gossip.” The host brings a guest on every week and shares a piece of anonymous gossip to dissect with the guest. It’s story-telling and analysis at its finest, it’s hilarious, and it lets me scratch that itch for gossip without having to gossip about anyone I know.
Q: What advice would you give to aspiring teachers who want to have a positive impact on their students?
A: Let yourself be delighted by your students. Celebrate their strengths. Be willing to let go of rigid notions of what you think your classroom will be and they will surprise you with their talents.
Q: Your son Hobbs just ran in the Paris Olympics, running his personal best in the 1500-meter race. Were you there for that? What was the experience in Paris like? And just how proud are you of Hobbs?
A: The Paris Olympics was a dream. I’m so grateful I was able to be there and watch Hobbs compete at the highest level.
Q: Do many people know that—coached by your husband, Mike—you qualified for the 2012 Olympic Trials in a personal best time of 2:44:55? Or that you placed second at the 2011 Detroit Free Press Marathon? Do you still compete?
A: My priorities have definitely shifted from competing to coaching, but I’m a competitor and a goal-setter at heart and I do still compete. I love going to local races and trying to win my age group. When I turned 50, I set a goal to complete a marathon in under three hours, which I did (by the skin of my teeth) at the Charlevoix Marathon in 2022. I think the next goal will be to go under three hours at age 55.
Q: In your cross country and track programs, how do you foster a sense of team camaraderie and sportsmanship? What are your goals for this year on the field?
A: Camaraderie is what it’s all about. The kids on the team have a shared purpose of lifting each other up to be the best they can be. For our varsity crew, that means putting ourselves in contention with the best teams in the state. But, ultimately it comes down to learning, growing, having fun, and caring for each other. To quote one of my athletes who puts it into perspective quite well, “Sometimes things are hard, but at the end of the day, we are a bunch of kids running in circles, and the friendships, experiences, and lessons that we gain matter more than actually running the 5Ks.”
Q: How do you spend your summers?
A: I like to spend as much time outdoors as possible. When I’m in town, you’ll find me running with my team on summer mornings, hiking in Bird Hills with my friends, or sitting on my porch reading books, chatting with neighbors, and writing recommendation letters. I also love to have big adventures. This summer my daughter and I hiked the Hardergrat Ridge trail in Switzerland when we were in Europe for the Olympics and last summer, guided by my husband, we climbed Mt. Rainier.
Q: What are you excited about these days?
A: I’m excited about a lot of things these days. I’m excited to watch my cross country team reach their potential and realize just how good they are, I’m excited that I was asked to teach a writing class to future English teachers at EMU, and I’m excited to travel to new places in the coming years to watch Hobbs compete.
