Laura Roché teaches her French I students at Beaumont Middle School about secondary colors. Brenna R. Kelly, Nov. 12, 2015

Laura Roché teaches her French I students at Beaumont Middle School about secondary colors.
Brenna R. Kelly, Nov. 12, 2015

Laura Roché Youngworth, a French teacher at Beaumont Middle School (Fayette County), has received the 2016 Southern Conference on Language Teaching (SCOLT) Teacher of the Year Award. Each state in the 13-state SCOLT region may send one state language Teacher of the Year to the regional conference, which was held Feb. 18-20.

Youngworth was selected based on her excellent teaching, her strong contributions to world languages, her letters of recommendation and an interview. She will advance to the national competition sponsored by the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Language (ACTFL).

During the ACTFL convention in Boston this November, she and four other regional teachers will vie for the title of ACTFL National Language Teacher of the Year. The selected teacher will serve as the national spokesperson for language learning in 2017.

Since 1992, Youngworth has taught multiple levels of French in middle and high school and is the world languages content lead for Fayette County Public Schools. She also works with and leads local and national efforts to improve world language education and is the host of the monthly podcast series, “Language Talk: KWLA.”

Youngworth’s presentations and publications are numerous, ranging from methods for increasing student communication to helping teachers build language programs. For her contributions to education, she has been featured in the University of Kentucky Alumni Magazine and Kentucky Teacher.

In the words of those who recommended her, Youngworth brings “a wealth of knowledge not only of French and the French-speaking people, but also of strong teaching practices that both challenge and engage the students while developing in them a strong interest for the language and the world around them.” Her “learning environment is alive and contagious! Students want to participate, students want to learn and students want to reach her high expectations!”