Growing up, Haddonfield Middle School Spanish teacher Dana Pilla always had an interest in learning about other cultures and speaking to people from other countries.
She wanted to be able to speak a foreign language just as perfectly as she spoke English.
Pilla achieved that goal and afterward wanted to spread her gift to others to help them learn to communicate like her, so she decided to become a teacher.
She didn’t expect to receive anything out of it other than to give others the opportunity to become multilingual, but this year she was honored for her hard work and service as a foreign language teacher.
Nominated by two of her colleagues, Pilla was named the Foreign Languages Teacher of New Jersey’s 2015 Teacher of the Year.
“I felt really honored. I didn’t have an award in mind when I started teaching. I feel every child should have the opportunity to learn another language. I am doing what I love and what I believe in, but I was really honored, surprised and appreciative,” Pilla said.
She began her career going to Rutgers University where she received her B.A. in Spanish, her M.A. in language education and M.A. in Spanish translation. She lived in Spain for a few years before becoming a teacher in New Jersey.
She has taught Spanish from second grade through the university level over the past 16 years. She has been teaching at Haddonfield Middle School for six years and continues to teach university classes part-time.
“I love teaching at different academic levels. It gives you a good perspective on how people learn and what interests them, depending on their age,” Pilla said.
Pilla has accomplished a lot in her career as a foreign language educator. She has helped create model assessments and rubrics and has worked on the NJDOE model curriculum writing team creating curriculum framework and assessments at the novice level.
Pilla frequently presents on a variety of topics relating to curriculum, assessment and collaboration through technology in world languages at local, state and regional conferences. She has also developed, and is currently implementing, online proficiency-based elementary Spanish courses for Rutgers University Camden.
FLENJ officially gave the award to Pilla at the awards ceremony at FLENJ’s Annual Conference on Feb. 28 at the Hyatt-Regency in New Brunswick. Pilla said when she received the award, it felt like everything had come full circle. As a novice, she attended her first FLENJ conference there and looked up to all of the presenters. Then, over 18 years, she evolved into the person giving the presentations as an expert.
“I felt honored to see my colleagues out there clapping for me and supporting me. It was just a really nice moment,” Pilla said.
Pilla will move on to compete at the regional level at NECTFL, with Teachers of the Year from 13 states and the District of Columbia.
The winner of that contest then competes to become the ACTFL Teacher of the Year at the national level.
“I really appreciate the support I get in Haddonfield, from students, parents and the administration. I am able to make my own curriculum and push these kids because of the support that I get. Not every teacher gets that, and I am very fortunate,” Pilla said.
FLENJ is a non-profit, professional organization that represents all world language educators at all levels in New Jersey. FLENJ advances and promotes the teaching of world languages in the state.
To accomplish this, it works to bring about improvements in areas of concern for world language educators, such as teacher training, articulation at all levels and curriculum development. For more information, go to www.flenj.org.
