Fayetteville-Manlius High School French teacher Dr. Denise Mahns has been recognized by the New York State Association for Language Teachers (NYSAFLT) as the New York State World Language Teacher of the Year.
“I am grateful to my colleagues and for the support of the Fayetteville-Manlius School District,” said Mahns. “I will strive to represent New York State’s World Language Teachers well in the coming year.”
The Ruth E. Wasley Distinguished Teacher Award is given to someone who has demonstrated excellence in K-12 foreign language teaching. Mahns was honored at the NYSAFLT Annual Conference in November, where she gave an acceptance speech highlighting what she called a crisis provoked by a teacher shortage. She recommended a three-pronged approach to recruiting new teachers: supporting world language teacher preparation programs, ensuring supportive policies and budgets through political action, and encouraging teachers to show students the joy they have in their profession and how rewarding world language teaching can be.
The conference included a group of nearly 300 world language teachers from across the state. There were various sessions focusing on the relevance of learning world languages at this global moment and bridging instructional practices as teachers implement revised New York State learning standards for world languages.
Mahns was nominated by her colleague Kate Stewart, who teaches German at FMHS and was the 2010 recipient of this award. Stewart, along with retired French teacher Richard Ernst, who won the award in 2017, and current French teachers Sarah Woodward-Jones and Alana Wielgosz accompanied Mahns to the conference.
Due to this designation, Mahns is now also the nominee for The Northeast Conference on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (NECTFL) Teacher of the Year (TOY) Award. As the nominee, Mahns will be recognized at the 2025 NECTFL conference, which will be held February 27- March 1, 2025 in New York City.
