Can you tell me a little about yourself?

My name is Nicole Snashall, and I am a speech language pathologist. This is my first year at Granite Bay, but before that, I was at Folsom and worked at Vista Del Lago High School.

Why did you decide to become a speech pathologist?

I feel like I’ve always wanted to work with kids. I feel like I wanted to be a teacher for a long time, and then I discovered speech therapy, and I really love working in small groups and helping kids meet their goals and improve their communication.

What do you like most about helping students with pathology?

I think the thing I like the most is that I really get to know students because I see them in small groups. I think that I really enjoy the flexibility of making my own schedule. I also enjoy going to other high schools in the district, so that’s cool, too. I get to see new campuses and meet new people. I really enjoy all of it.

In your free time, do you have any hobbies or interests that you like to do outside of school?

In my free time, I really love going for walks. I’ve been walking a lot since the summer. I really enjoy spending time with my family. I watch TV, of course. What else do I enjoy doing? I’ve been trying to read some more books lately. So, yeah, those are some of my hobbies.

Is there anything else that you would like people to know about you?

I’m located in the back of campus, and if you ever get a pass from Miss Snashall, just know it’s a good thing. I’m really just excited to be here. Everyone’s been really nice.

Can you tell me a little about yourself?

My name is Tiane Arnold, but everybody calls me Miss Nay. I teach ACT Lab A and B, and I co-teach Unified Sports with Dede Walker.

Why did you decide to become an education specialist?

When I was younger, my pastor’s son had Down syndrome, and I used to nanny for him, and my dad thought with that experience that it would help me out in this job. He was getting emails about teaching in-home therapy with kids with autism. And he suggested, ‘Well, maybe you should try it out.’ I did. I got the job on the spot and started in 2012 right after high school. After that, I kept working in different classrooms and schools, but there were certain teachers that weren’t always ethical, and it rubbed me the wrong way. Instead of complaining at the time, I decided, ‘You know what? I’m just going to go and be in charge of my own little world and fix what I can fix.’ So I decided to get into teaching. 

What do you like most about teaching special education students?

Their personalities. It’s never boring, so always the things that they say or what they’re willing to share with you about their likes and dislikes. It’s always entertaining to see how somebody else views the world, and that’s one of my favorite things. My other one is seeing something just click. Whether it’s [when] we’re working on behaviors or working on advocating for ourselves, or working on either English or math, it’s really neat to see them say, “Guess that makes sense.”

On the topic of Unified Sports, how do you feel seeing the connection between all the students together? 

I love that. It really helps share what our world is like in the special education community, whether you’re mild or severe. It’s really neat to see how everybody can get along and be together, regardless of their capabilities and the differences that they have. So it’s really nice. It’s, you know, a blessing every single day.

In your free time, do you have any hobbies or interests that you like to do outside of school?

I just had a baby, so she’s my hobby. But I love to go to Disneyland or Disney World, so anything nostalgic is my hobby. I like to do stuff like that.

Is there anything else that you would like people to know about you?

I’m very social, but I guess some people would know that already. But for one, for the ones who don’t know me, I am very social, so you can always come by my class if you want to talk or hang out.

Can you tell me a little about yourself, like your full name, and what classes do you teach?

My name is Omar Alcantar, and I teach CCIM 1. I’m a co-teacher here for CCIM 1, and I’m also an education specialist, so I provide specialized academic instruction on Wednesdays. 

Why did you decide to become a math teacher?

I became a teacher because I reconnected with my passion for teaching. Initially, I wanted to go more into video production. In college, I was doing a lot of promotional content for concert promoters. As I graduated from San Jose State, I started realizing I really had a passion for teaching. I have a lot of patience for students to teach, and a lot of empathy, so it’s very easy for me to explain things.

What do you like most about teaching students math or just helping students in general? 

I like to help students develop a growth mindset to start. I think that when you can believe in yourself, you’re able to achieve any goal. I love teaching them academic content, academic language and all of that, but I always teach it from a place where I’m teaching them growth. I want to make sure they know they have to trust themselves first to achieve their goals. I love teaching math because specific formulas are very factual-like. For example, one plus one is two, and it’s always going to be two no matter what, right? But there can be different ways of explaining that to students so they can acquire that knowledge. I think that’s one of the reasons I like math, because even though there’s always going to be one answer to a problem, there’s like different ways of getting there. 

On Wednesday, what do you teach as an education specialist?

So on Wednesdays, I provide specialized academic instruction. So what that is, I work on specific goals with students, and the goals can be anywhere from improving their writing skills or improving their math skills, their thinking skills, sometimes their self advocacy skills.

It’s more of teaching them specific skills in the specific area. That’s something I also love, because I feel like I’m also coaching them through school. That’s kind of where I also incorporate more growth set mindset strategies, encouraging them to take risks in the classroom, ask more questions, and we practice a little bit more, more drills during those days. So I feel like that’s a day where I get to check in with a specific group of students and kind of just ask them about how their week is going, and ask them about their challenges during the week, and I try to address those by providing them [with] some techniques or skills that they can practice.

In your free time, do you have any hobbies or interests that you like to do outside of school?

I love watching films and producing and editing them. But right now, one of my biggest hobbies and activities that I love to do is running. I recently got into long distance running. I actually just ran a half marathon on Sunday.  I ran 13.1 miles in a race that’s called the Urban Cow Half Marathon here in South Land Park, and I was able to achieve a personal best time for the half marathon. So I’ve been training a lot. I spend most of my evenings working out, so that I can prove in my running, running techniques and all of that. And while I’m running, you know, like part of the passion I have for producing and content creation, I take a lot of videos. I take a lot of photographs of the places I run at, even like the outfits I’m wearing, shoes I wear just so I can kind of have a journal of my training. So that’s one of the things I love doing during my free time. I go out and do a lot of running, and I just love the running community in general. I think every runner in the running community is very kind and supportive of each other. And so not only do I enjoy running because it keeps me healthy, it helps me de-stress, but I also love that it helps me socialize with other people that are also wanting to improve their lives.

 Is there anything else that you would like people to know about you?

I want students to know that we want them to develop a good attitude towards themselves. Like I said, initially, I really focus on developing their growth mindset. Just having them move from a fixed mindset to a growth mindset is key in people’s success. Okay, so that’s one thing I would want them to know that if they are going to be joining our class, [as] that’s one of the skills we’re also going to be working on. So it won’t just be math, but it’ll also be math [while] incorporating that growth mindset, so that they can continue to do great things and teach them to believe in themselves, so they can take on their goals in general. And we just want them to feel successful and feel welcome in our classroom as well. So if they feel nervous or they feel a little intimidated about math, I think this will be a good, good class for them, because we’ll be here to support them, and we’ll make sure that everyone is feeling welcome in the classroom.