Washington Post Names Two As ‘Best In The Region’

Late yesterday afternoon, Anne Arundel County Public Schools announced that two Anne Arundel County educators have been recognized as being among the best in the region as part of The Washington Post’s program highlighting educational excellence.

Eastport Elementary School Principal Lynne Evans is one of 19 principals to receive a Distinguished Educational Leadership Award from the newspaper. The awards are given annually to principals “who day after day go beyond the demands of their highly challenging professions to create exceptional learning environments for our children.”

Marley Elementary School teacher Cheryl Ann Cox is one of 21 teachers to be honored as part of the 27th annual Agnes Meyer Outstanding Teacher Awards. The awards are named for Agnes Meyer, the wife of Eugene Meyer, a former publisher of The Washington Post. They recognize “teachers who have shown initiative, creativity and an exceptional degree of professionalism in teaching.”

Evans has been an Anne Arundel County educator since 1980, and a principal since 2002, when she assumed the leadership of Eastport Elementary, which has the highest percentage of students receiving free and reduced-price meals in the county. The school has made state Adequate Yearly Progress targets in every year since 2004, and in 2008, 100 percent of the school’s third-graders scored proficient or advanced on the Maryland School Assessment math exam.

Cox has been a teacher since 1995 and has taught in Anne Arundel County since 2001. Before becoming the Title I Math Resource Teacher at Marley in 2008, she taught fifth grade at Crofton Meadows Elementary. In her current position, she helps teachers in kindergarten through fifth grade with planning, content, interventions, and job-embedded staff development.