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Urtubey, who has been an educator for 11 years, works with elementary school students, individualizing lessons to match their academic, emotional and behavioral needs. That can put her everywhere in a school, from spending hours with struggling pre-K students to helping a fifth-grader with science class and strategizing with teachers on how to work with their special-needs students.
She said her approach is to think about a child holistically taking into account their interests, hobbies, family structure and community and using that to understand what they will need and how to find their strengths.
“There’s always strengths to find, and so once you find those strengths, you start there,” Urtubey said.
Nevada Special Education Teacher Named 2021 National Teacher of the Year
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WASHINGTON, May 6, 2021 /PRNewswire/ The Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) today announced that Juliana Urtubey, an elementary school special education teacher, is the 2021 National Teacher of the Year.
Urtubey, an educator for 11 years, teaches at Kermit R. Booker, Sr. Innovative Elementary School in Las Vegas, where she serves as a co-teacher in pre-kindergarten through fifth-grade special education settings and as an instructional strategist developing supports to meet students differing academic, social-emotional, and behavioral needs.
Known as Ms. Earth for her efforts to beautify schools and unify the community through murals and gardens, Urtubey has helped raise funds for garden programs at two Las Vegas schools. In one program, the garden was tended to by the student Garden Gnomies club and offered opportunities for innovative