{"id":3834,"date":"2015-06-22T14:30:12","date_gmt":"2015-06-22T18:30:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/2015\/06\/22\/a-talent-for-bringing-out-the-best\/"},"modified":"2022-11-07T17:23:43","modified_gmt":"2022-11-07T22:23:43","slug":"a-talent-for-bringing-out-the-best","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/a-talent-for-bringing-out-the-best\/","title":{"rendered":"A talent for bringing out the best"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"ATalentForBringingOuttheBest\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Just a few days after graduating with her elementary education degree from Furman, Madison Smith \u201915 has happily taken the plunge into the world of adulthood.<\/p>\n

She\u2019s rented her first house near downtown Greenville and purchased two white rocking chairs that she assembled herself to use for daily al fresco dinners on the front porch.<\/p>\n

The location couldn\u2019t be better. Smith passes one of her favorite buildings on her commute to work and to Furman for graduate classes. It\u2019s a surprising choice, a modest looking building with train-shaped playground equipment in the front.<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery day, I get to drive past my dream,\u201d said Smith.<\/p>\n

It only took two weeks at the Meyer Center for Special Children for Smith to figure out what she wanted to do with the rest of her life: teach. She\u2019ll begin teaching in a third-grade classroom of her own this fall at Oakland Elementary School in Spartanburg School District 2.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t find teaching,\u201d she said. \u201cTeaching found me.\u201d<\/p>\n

A few years ago, Smith would have written her story a little differently. She had visited Furman briefly on a college road trip with her dad, Bill, but her plan was to attend Emory University.<\/p>\n

At the last minute, she just had a feeling that something wasn\u2019t right and she made a last minute decision to switch to Furman cold turkey.<\/p>\n

Smith still isn\u2019t sure exactly why, but thinks it may have been \u201cdivine intervention.\u201d<\/p>\n

From there, everything fell into place.<\/p>\n

In her first semester as a freshman, Smith took Education Professor Judy Stuart\u2019s Human Growth and Development course and was assigned to complete fieldwork in a preschool classroom at the Meyer Center. It was a perfect match.<\/p>\n

She scrapped her plans to major in neuroscience and became an elementary education major instead.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople tend to discount children with severe special needs,\u201d said Smith. \u201cIt\u2019s important to focus on what they can do, rather than on what they can\u2019t do.\u201d<\/p>\n

During her sophomore year, she worked with Stuart to research iPad apps and how they can be used to help students with disabilities. She and other Furman education majors presented their research at the Council for Exceptional Children National Conference in San Antonio, Texas.<\/p>\n

Smith has since adopted Stuart as one of her two Furman moms.<\/p>\n

\u201cMadison Smith is one of the most multifaceted students I\u2019ve met. Since meeting her as a freshman, I\u2019ve seen her grow into a mature young woman with layers of talent,\u201d said Stuart. \u201cHer passion for working with children, particularly children with disabilities, is what underlies her motivation to learn and to succeed. Her thirst for knowledge is seemingly insatiable and her enthusiasm is infectious. She will be an incredible role model for the many students she will teach.\u201d<\/p>\n

Smith\u2019s second mom, Nancy Cooper, Furman\u2019s coordinator of volunteer services, has seen Smith walk through and create even more doors of opportunity for students during her time at the university.<\/p>\n

Smith started out as a volunteer with Heller Service Corps and became the coordinator for Camp Spearhead, a program for youth and adults with special needs and disabilities in Marietta, S.C. She went on to serve as division head of special needs and was named the director of volunteer relations during her senior year.<\/p>\n

One of Smith\u2019s latest contributions to Furman is the Lunch Buddies program at Heritage Elementary School, which pairs Furman students and kindergarteners through fifth graders who are struggling either at home or at school. This year, 10 Furman students volunteered as mentors, which meant eating lunch and chatting with their new friends each week.<\/p>\n

Cooper describes Smith as a \u201cconnector and reflector.\u201d With her extensive network of friends from freshmen to seniors, Smith is gifted at connecting people to Furman programs that will interest them, said Cooper.<\/p>\n

She\u2019s also a reflector in that she always downplays her role in a project and puts the spotlight on others, said Cooper. \u201cShe always puts someone else first. She lives and breathes to make the world a better place.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Smith, her senior year was her most challenging as she tried to balance campus commitments, teaching full-time in a classroom, and completing assignments as a Furman student.<\/p>\n

Still, she felt very prepared for her teaching career. \u201cI feel like I know my stuff. I\u2019m equipped to use new technology,\u201d she said. \u201cIf I need help, all the professors in the Education Department have their doors open to me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Smith completed her teaching practicum in a second grade classroom at Holly Springs-Motlow Elementary School in Spartanburg School District One.<\/p>\n

One of her most successful units was a poetry lesson centered around Sharon Creech\u2019s book, Love That Dog<\/em>, which tells the story of Jack and his beloved dog, Sky. Students used oil pastels and watercolors to tell stories of their own, which Smith turned into a three-dimensional bulletin board in the hallway.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey completely blew me out of the water,\u201d she said. \u201cThey were so proud of themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now that graduation is over and summer is here, Smith isn\u2019t slowing down. She was selected as the recipient of the Waco F. Childers, Jr. and Elaine Duffy Childers Special Education Scholarship for teacher candidates who demonstrate a desire to teach students with special needs and will begin graduate classes at Furman this month (June 9).<\/p>\n

A fan of cooking, baking, and crafting, Smith said she\u2019s already planning how she\u2019ll fix up her classroom to harmonize with Oakland\u2019s pirate theme. She already has pirate-themed books from Furman alumna Melinda Long \u201982, such as How I Became a Pirate<\/em>. She\u2019s also contemplating a handmade burlap door sign that reads \u201cS.S. Smith.\u201d<\/p>\n

One of her next projects: picking out a book to read on the first day of school. \u201cI can\u2019t wait,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Smith, a native of Isle of Palms, S.C., is the daughter of Bill Smith and Kathryn Martin. She has three siblings, Ford, Johnson, and Grace.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Just a few days after graduating with her elementary education degree from Furman, Madison Smith \u201915 has happily taken the plunge into the world of adulthood. She\u2019s rented her first […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":265,"featured_media":14988,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,26,34,3,60,63,28,35],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3834","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-academic-department-page","category-administrative","category-admission","category-alumni","category-alumni-profiles","category-career-services","category-education","category-parent-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3834","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/265"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3834"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3834\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3834"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3834"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3834"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}