(This week The Columbian-Progress spotlights Jefferson Middle School math teacher Meghan Mee.)
Q: When and where were you born?
A: I was born in Pascagoula April 17, 1988.
Q: Where did you attend school?
A: I attended Gautier High School and went to Southern Miss for both my bachelor’s and master’s.
Q: What was your childhood like?
A: It was a little bit of everything. Mom and dad divorced when I was 7, and I stayed in Gautier. It was a good childhood, though. They made sure I had everything I needed, and I had in involved grandparents. I danced from kindergarten on and was always involved in school and recreation. It was a lot of fun.
Q: Where do you work? Tell us about your job/company.
A: I teach seventh-grade math, and what that entails right now is a lot of ratios and proportions and trying to connect what we’re learning to the real world. That way when they’re sitting in my classroom they don’t look at me and say “We’re never going to use this.” My main goal is not only to teach them the concepts but how they’re going to apply it. Math is definitely one of those subjects where a lot of students struggle. If they don’t know why they’re learning something, they’re not going to want to learn it. There’s a lot of relationship building of trying to get to know them and their background so I can make those connections for what their future might look like.
Q: What led you to your profession?
A: I was an alternate route teacher. I have two business degrees — a bachelor’s science in business administration with an emphasis in international and a master’s in business administration. I went into higher education first and worked for Southern Miss for seven years. I worked for their admissions office, and during that time I volunteered to teach. I taught UNV 101, which is basically a learning skills course for freshman coming in who were in a lot of remedial classes. They just needed help in transition in studying for high school to studying for university. I also advised students who were undeclared majors. With the teaching and advising and building those relationships with those students, I learned how my experiences in college and the resources available to me growing up that maybe they didn’t have helped me try to catch them up academically. A friend of mine went through the alternate route and told me I could be teaching my own class within a semester, and I thought “awesome.” I saw in those seven years I didn’t want to go into business. I wanted to work with the students and have the biggest impact on their lives as I could. The relationships you build with your students throughout the year is, in a lot of cases, 10 times more important than what you’re teaching them. They’re not going to learn from someone they don’t like. You have to build those relationships so they’re open to receiving that material, which is the part I like the most.
Q: What is the most challenging aspect of your job?
A: Classroom management. These students come from a variety of backgrounds and don’t have the same expectations they have at home as they do at school. Some have higher at home and some have no expectations at home. Holding them accountable to the expectations in the classroom and being consistent with them, it can be trying to get everybody on task and focused. It can be hard when you realize what they may be going through at home.
Q: What advice would you give someone considering your career path?
A: You have to evaluate why you want to teach. Are you willing to put in 10-12 hour days so you are ready to teach your students and build relationships? If you want to go into teaching because you want to have the summers off and great holidays, you make up that time in prep to build quality lessons the students will enjoy and actually learn from. You have to evaluate your motivation.
Q: Who is the person who has been most influential in your life?
A: Why I wanted to teach math would be my high school math teacher, Brenda Wiley. My mom, Lora McDonald, is where I get my management skills. She managed a convenience store when I was growing up, so that was my first job. Working with her I saw how she handled the different scenarios, and that’s where I very first learned that if people like you and you build those relationships, they are much more likely to do stuff for you. If they don’t like you, they don’t have any investment in doing something for you. My English teacher, Linda Blackwell, helped me a lot. I was the valedictorian of my class so my very first big public speaking event was my valedictorian speech. She helped me write that and coached me through it. I have a lot of major influences in my life that helped shaped me. My parents didn’t go to college so my high school counselors, career services and teachers were very involved to make sure I got to Southern where I needed to be because I didn’t come from money.
Q: What is your spouse’s name?
A: Steven. He is the assistant manager for GameStop in Hattiesburg.
Q: Do you have children?
A: I have a 2-year-old daughter, Eleanor.
Q: If you could have anything for your last meal on earth, what would it be?
A: A steak with a baked potato and a nice garden salad.
Q: If you could travel anywhere in the world, where would you go?
A: I want to do a tour of Europe. I did a study abroad in Spain, and we went all over Spain. The place I really want to go back to is Barcelona and see the La Sagrada Familia because I got to see the outside but didn’t get to go inside.
Q: What hobbies do you like to do in your spare time?
A: Play with Eleanor. My daughter takes up my entire life. I like to dance and choreograph dances. I play video games, which my students tend to like because I know their video games. I’m married to a gamer so I can’t avoid that. I like to read, but since I commute from Hattiesburg I listen to audio books.
Q: What do you enjoy about Columbia and Marion County?
A: The community. You can talk to just about anybody here, and they’re going to know about other people in Columbia. If I have a question about a student or the community and where to find something, they know. It’s a smaller community so it’s more close-knit. I like the positive aspects of that because you have students who grew up with each other. Their relationships are already made with each other.
Q: If you could have lunch with anyone from your life or history, who would it be and why?
A: My uncle David. He passed away before I was born, but I grew up hearing stories about this man and how much my brothers liked him and how much he loved life and the people around him. I never got to meet him.
Q: Would you rather read a good book or watch a good movie?
A: I would like to watch a good movie based on a book. That way I can go back into that book and get to know my characters better. I love series of books and seeing how characters develop and change.
Q: What moment in your life has had the biggest impact on who you are today?
A: When I was eight or nine, my dad, Bobby Snyder, told me “Meghan, if your brother gets in trouble, it’s your fault.” I looked at him like “excuse me.” He said your brother is going to follow your example so whatever role you model he’s going to follow along. When he gets in trouble, you’re in trouble because you set the example and show him right from wrong. He’s five years behind me. From that point on, I looked at my actions a little differently. My dad constantly made me look outside of the box and at the bigger picture and what I wanted for my future. From then on whenever I made a decision, I wasn’t just analyzing it for me. I had to analyze for him as well.
Q: How would you like to be remembered?
A: As someone who cared about others that would go out of her way to help somebody else and not just when it’s convenient. Chances are 100 years from now, not many people aren’t going to remember me. But I have roughly 120 students that I teach every year. If these 120 students remember me as the math teacher who cared about me and invested me by taking extra time out of her day, I can pay it forward and make that a positive change for someone else. I hope somewhere down the line I’ve affected enough people to make a positive change in the world that it makes a difference.
— Joshua Campbell
Pictured Above: Jefferson Middle School math teacher Meghan Mee originally pursued a career in business but was drawn to academics after teaching voluntarily at Southern Miss. | Photo by Joshua Campbell
