BY CLIFF SMELLEY
The right position.
That’s what Michelle Ware was waiting for. She had earned her master’s degree in Educational Leadership from the University of North Florida in 2022, but wasn’t looking to leave her job as a teacher for the first opportunity that came along.
“I love the classroom,” Ware said. “I was like, ‘I’ll just wait until I get the right position.’ I was not eager to jump from the classroom to (assistant principal). I was like, ‘When the timing’s right, it’ll happen.’”
With God’s guidance, Ware realized the timing was right — and the position was right — to make that jump, accepting the job as assistant principal at Starke Elementary School.
“I prayed a lot about this position when it did become available,” said Ware, who taught at Keystone Heights’ McRae Elementary the last seven years. “I fully feel that this was the right time. I really feel that what I have learned in the classroom in 21 years I can now use to help other teachers cultivate and learn. That’s kind of where God’s leading me to, to let me share what I’ve learned in the classroom with other people and help them.”
Ware, who lives in Hampton, is now one of two new leaders at Starke Elementary, joining Principal Laurén Morgan, who was assistant principal at Southside/Bradford Elementary School the past three years.
“I feel like it’s going to be awesome,” Ware said. “It’s kind of like we’re starting something new, but it’s not a bad new. We’re really cultivating and pushing things in the right direction. Not that they hadn’t been doing great, but we really want to help the students and the teachers and the community really reach their best selves.
“I’m excited to be a part of that, to watch it unfold. (The school was) one point away from a B this year. I’m really excited to see how we’re going to grow next year.”
Ware said she grew up wanting to be a teacher. She acted as if she was one when playing with siblings and cousins, all of whom were younger than her.
“I always played school,” Ware said. “I was always corralling them into doing whatever I wanted them to do.”
Ware also credited her fourth-grade teacher for inspiring her to want to be a teacher. The teacher gave Ware extra worksheets that she could use when playing make-believe as a teacher and let Ware put stickers on the papers she was grading.
“She just really took me in and made me feel extra special,” Ware said, adding, “I can’t even remember one thing she taught me that year, to be honest. It was the connection that I felt.”
Ware earned her bachelor’s degree at the University of Florida and began her teaching career in Alachua County, which she described as a “full-circle moment.” She went to school in Alachua and received a full-ride college scholarship from the Education Foundation of Alachua County, which she earned by remaining an A-B student and meeting other criteria (such as avoiding troubles with drugs and law enforcement) since she was an eighth-grader.
“It was really great to then give back to Alachua County and become an educator for their community,” she said.
It was also neat for Ware to begin her career as a fourth-grade teacher, reminding her of the fourth-grade teacher who meant so much to her as a student.
“It was just awesome,” Ware said. “It was like a Disney movie.”
Ware taught multiple grades from fourth to eighth. She spent 14 years in Alachua County before her career took her to Clay County and McRae Elementary.
It was almost like following in the footsteps of Morgan, Ware said. Morgan, who graduated from UF the year before Ware did, taught at McRae. Then, when Morgan was at Melrose Elementary School, Ware used to see her during the summers, hanging out at the beach with her fellow teachers who were friends of Morgan’s.
“I actually knew her through other people,” Ware said. “It’s kind of neat how our lives have just kind of circled each other this whole time. We weren’t like best friends or even friends, really. We were acquaintances.”
Those acquaintances are now working side by side at Starke Elementary.
“I’m just so happy and blessed to be a part of what she’s doing here and to work alongside her,” Ware said.
Ware said she began working toward a move in administration when she took advantage of a cohort program at UNF, which she began in 2020. The situation was similar to the one that led her to accept the job at Starke Elementary.
“It, again, was God knocking on my heart, saying, ‘This is what I want you to do.’ I kept seeing the fliers (about the cohort program), or somebody would put something in my mailbox, or I would get an email,” Ware said. “I was like, ‘OK, God. I hear you.’ Whenever he keeps knocking, it’s time to answer the door.”
As she prepares to enter her first year as an administrator, Ware said one of her goals is for Starke Elementary to rise to an A school in the state’s rankings. She said she and Morgan both know what it takes to get there. Ware saw significant improvements take place at McRae, while Morgan witnessed the same at Southside/Bradford.
Ware said it takes a lot of work to improve in the state’s grade rankings. It also takes everyone working together as a team — a team that now has two new leaders.
“Change is hard for everybody,” Ware said. “I just hope (Starke Elementary staff) can learn to trust us and be as excited as we are to be here and to work together to show the community and our students and our parents and Bradford County what we can do in our classrooms.”
Improving a school’s performance, of course, involves focusing on the rigors of the work being done in the classrooms, but the focus can’t prevent students from also having enjoyable moments.
“You want to make sure you’re balancing the fun with the academics,” Ware said.
When she’s not on a school campus, Ware enjoys spending time with her children, Silver, 10, and Madison, 11, and her fiancé, Joshua Davis. They enjoy fishing and being at the beach.
Ware also spends a good amount of time at ballparks as her son is an “avid baseball player.”
She also enjoys being a part of her church, Orange Heights Baptist.
“If I’m not at the ballpark, I’m at the beach or church, usually,” Ware said.
Though there has been flurries of activity at Starke Elementary, making new hires and prepping for the school year, Ware admitted it’s quiet and doesn’t seem like she’s at a school. Therefore, she’s eagerly awaiting the return of teachers and students.
“I’m really excited just to get to meet everybody and the kids and get those first-day hugs and high-fives,” Ware said.
She’ll enter the year with more duties than she’s had in the past as a classroom teacher, but she’s sure to keep relying on the advice she once received from a teacher, who was referencing a Jimmy Buffett song: “Breathe In, Breathe Out, Move On.”
“Don’t get all worked up over stuff,” Ware said. “You can handle only one thing at a time.”
It’ll also help that she’ll be breathing in, breathing out and moving on at the school God wanted her to be at.
“God just kept knocking on my heart about coming over to Bradford,” Ware said, adding, “It was just meant to be.”
