Wilsonville High School has a new addition to the English department, Juliana Ko; A Virginia native and graduate of both Virginia Tech and James Madison University. She has taught at both the high school and middle school level, but feels that high school was, “where my personality and the way I wanted to teach fit best.”

This will be Ms. Ko’s fifth year teaching and she is excited about getting to know all of her students, in both her Sophomore and Junior English classes. “I really do like just getting to know kids, helping them out beyond just English, cause I think that’s really what teaching is about.”  

One of the things she is most looking forward to here at Wilsonville is the freedom she has with her curriculum. “Virginia is very rigid. I think that was the number one thing…the culture shock that I had to overcome. In Virginia the teachers are told what to teach, they’re told how much time you’re supposed to give, and you really don’t have any room to do what you would really like, or what you really want,” Say’s Ko who is also very excited about being able to teach Persepolis for the first time, “In Virginia I wasn’t allowed to teach that, because it was too controversial.”

The sense of community, and camaraderie, here at Wilsonville has also been a positive for Ko, “It might also be because Wilsonville is so small. Which is nice because everyone knows each other. That can be good because there’s a lot of camaraderie, from a teacher standpoint it might make us go crazy cause everyone knows each other and likes each other, so everyone wants to hang-out. That is always a better atmosphere than kids who don’t know each other and don’t even want to get to know each other better. It’s a good problem to have.”

We are excited to welcome Ms. Ko to Wilsonville High School. She is located in room 103 if you’d like to drop by and say hello.

Read the print edition of the Paw Print coming out October 26th for an extended interview where we discuss what inspired her to become a teacher, her plans for this year’s English classes and, her newfound love of disk-golf.