Each year, Waubonsee Community College names an Outstanding Faculty Member. This award is given to educators who have demonstrated exceptional dedication and innovation in their field. This year’s Outstanding Faculty Member is Kathleen Randall, Professor of Education. Randall has served Waubonsee as a full-time Education instructor since 2002 and has led the department since then.
“Teachers mark not only with a grade but also mark hearts and minds,” said Randall. “Teaching is a unique career, a unique power, and that power allows us to make a difference, a connection, and a meaningful one that will hopefully last a lifetime.”
Randall, the daughter of educators, says realizing that teaching was her calling made all the difference in her life. Only after taking an introductory education course at a local community college did Randall become convinced she wanted to follow in her parents’ footsteps.
At Waubonsee, Randall is a leader in the Scaling Education Pathways in Illinois (SEPI) implementation team, a statewide project created to address the shortage of licensed education professionals. As part of that team, Randall worked with representatives from East Aurora School District 131, West Aurora School District 129, Northern Illinois University (NIU), and the Community Foundation of the Fox River Valley to help students transition into post-secondary Education programs, thereby contributing to the future of education in Illinois. SEPI provides an education pathway for anyone who desires to make their dream of a career in education come true.
Under Randall’s guidance and through SEPI, Waubonsee partners with NIU, East Aurora High School, and West Aurora High School to offer a streamlined college credit pathway, allowing students to enter at the beginning of their junior or senior year of high school or their first year of college at Waubonsee and complete with a teaching license. High school students can take dual credit courses at East Aurora High School or West Aurora High School while finishing their high school coursework.
SEPI is aligned to meet a growing demand for qualified teachers in Illinois as the state continues to face a critical teacher shortage crisis, confirmed by both the Illinois Association of School Boards in its May/June 2024 report and the Illinois Association of Regional Superintendents of Schools (IARSS) annual survey. IARSS published that 73% of schools indicated they had teacher shortages, with over 2,500 teacher, special education, and support staff positions reported as vacant or filled with persons less than qualified.
Waubonsee is helping develop future teachers by working in the local community with students who aspire to change lives in the teaching profession and working with institutions that want to partner to create career pathways. SEPI allows participating institutions flexibility in determining what kind of partnerships will be needed at the post-secondary and secondary education levels to best serve and attract students interested in entering the pathway across the state.
Because Randall worked for 13 years with high school students who had learning disabilities and behavioral, social, and emotional disorders, she draws on both her secondary and post-secondary experience in advising future teachers. She helps her students make connections through the National Education Association/Illinois Education Association (NEA/IEA) and has taken students to multiple preservice teacher conferences and trainings as an advisor for the NEA/IEA Student Educator’s Association.
Twenty years ago, Randall established the Waubonsee Student Education Association (WSEA) and continues to serve as the advisor to help students prepare to be future educators. Heading into her twenty-third year at Waubonsee, Randall says she continues to see a familiar pattern emerge. It is common for students Randall taught to return to Waubonsee with their adult children years later, who also want to pursue a teaching career. “I am most proud of students who are now giving back as teachers,” said Randall. “They are influencing others and changing lives. It brings tears to my eyes to see how I helped someone decide that this was their calling.”
Randall’s leadership reaches outside of Waubonsee’s district and beyond. She is actively involved in other statewide efforts, such as the Illinois Community College Educator Leaders-Grow Your Own Initiative, the Illinois Community College Educational Faculty Association, and the Educators Rising group, all of which are focused on addressing the critical shortage of education professionals in Illinois.
Both students and colleagues who nominated Randall’s instructional effectiveness, which is based largely on her serving as a role model and mentor, comment on her ability to create a welcoming environment and action to support student success. She models the importance of teaching and that it is not only a profession but a vocation, one she calls “a calling and a profession combined.”
Randall’s advice for aspiring teachers is to continue to learn. “Stay up to date with the current changes and needs. There are a lot of changes. There is never a time to not learn,” she says. “There’s always a reason to take classes or the opportunity to continue one’s education.”
Randall says Waubonsee’s quality, affordability, and variety of instruction allow students to explore and look around in those formative years and help students with many different classes that transfer directly, whether they are pursuing a two-year degree or not. She invites students who are still determining what they want to do to consider taking an introduction to education course, special education, or educational psychology. “These courses can be life-changing for you,” she says.
Randall will be recognized and presented with the Outstanding Faculty Member Award at a college event in August. The college’s Outstanding Faculty Member Selection Committee, comprised of previous award recipients and academic administrators, makes the final selection.
