Congratulations to Mrs. Billie Butler and Mrs. Ashley Smith ! These two ladies are UHS Teachers of the Year.
Mrs. Billie is a kindergarten teacher here at UHS. This is her 13 year teaching kindergarten, and prior to that, she taught sixth, seventh, and eighth grade for one-half year.
Her and her husband, Scott, have been married for 32 years and have three children, Andrea, Justin and Landon; three grandbabies, Ruby, Bryant and Bo. They have lived in the Rock City Community for 31 years and all their children attended UHS.
She enjoys teaching and watching her students grow as they progress from one grade to the next. Mrs. Billie believes that each child has a story to tell and feels blessed to get to be a small part of her students' lives.
Ms. Ashley Smith is married to Chris Smith and together they have 3 beautiful
daughters. Emma, senior at SCHS, Bailey, 6th grade at UHS, and Taylor, PK at UHS.
She attended UHS from Kindergarten to 8th grade where she played basketball. Her
dad and husband attended UHS as well.
Along with attending UHS, Ms. Ashley attended SCHS where she played basketball and softball. She received her Bachelor's Degree from TTU and her Master's Degree from Cumberland University. Ms. Ashley is currently in her 13th year as an educator at UHS. In that time, she has taught Pre-K, 4th grade, and 5th/6th; site-director of the Before/After School program; assistant basketball coach for Lady Redcoats; Beta Club sponsor; Middle school dance sponsor.
Outside of school, Ms. Ashley is a sports fanatic. She loves watching football and
basketball, with her favorite teams being the Tennessee Titans and the Vanderbilt
Commodores. When not watching sports, you can find her helping her husband on the farm with his cattle or taking Bailey to her sporting events.
When thinking about why she wanted to become a teacher, Ms. Ashley thinks of her
favorite teacher, Ms. Benita Lane. Ms. Ashley states, “I had Ms. Lane as a teacher at
UHS and she never gave up on any student in my class. She made learning fun and
taught us things outside of the curriculum such as cross-stitching. When I was given the opportunity to return to UHS as a teacher, I felt honored to be able to return to my alma mater to educate young minds just as the teachers I had at UHS did for me. To me, teaching is more than a textbook. Teaching is getting to know each student as a person and letting them know that you care about their well-being. Education is part of their well-being but when you get to know them as a person, they tend to learn better for you because they know you truly care about them.” One of Ms. Ashley’s favorite quotes is from Aristotle and it says: "Educating the mind without educating the heart is no education at all." Ms. Ashley states, “I am very honored that the faculty at UHS chose me as the 5-8 teacher of the year. In my opinion, though, we are all teachers of the year because we show up every day and love the children as we do our own.”