It was a surprise to many students this year when they walked into school and saw the number of new teachers. One of these new teachers, Mrs. Kimberly Andela, is an English special education teacher, who says she being a teacher “unofficially” when she was young.

“I first started “teaching” when I was in middle school and babysat a young boy who was learning English as his second language, we would do work all summer together so he could improve for school in the fall,” Mrs. Andela explained.

Mrs. Andela started college at Passaic County Community College, before switching to Ramapo College, where she majored in arts, concentrating specifically on photography. After completing her bachelor’s degree, she worked in the city for a few years in the photo industry, but then realized the commute was too difficult and she had no desire to work in a family portrait studio. She decided after this experience she wanted to go back to school for her masters, but it was required that she first needed to take a few more English classes. She then enrolled in both Bergen Community College and University of Phoenix, to finish her English classes. After this, she went on to study teaching with a dual certificate in English and Students with Disabilities at Drew University.

Even though she is a teacher now, Mrs. Andela still loves photography, and loves what she created while in college.

“My proudest moment was probably my senior thesis exhibit for my bachelor’s degree. I was a photography major and we had an art gallery showing of our final exhibitions. I put in a lot of hard work for that exhibition and am still proud of the images I created,” Mrs. Andela explained.

Along with loving photography, Mrs. Andela also enjoys hiking. She explains that if she won a million dollars, she would “pay off my student debt and then travel the world learning about different cultures and hiking.”

Mrs. Andela hopes to also become a principal in the future, and to continue to work with either high school or middle schoolers.