After 31 years of teaching, Mrs. Lana Ray has decided to retire. Mrs. Ray, who has taught many subjects over the duration of her tenure, says, “For me, it’s time to explore new opportunities in my life,” Ray said, “I’ve been very blessed with a happy marriage to a wonderful man. We love to travel, and we also love to work together. Retirement from teaching will give me more time to do both. I’m especially looking forward to helping support him in his work as the minister at Hickerson Station Church of Christ.”

Ray began her career teaching at a small private school teaching  grades 7 through 12 in earth science, biology, and physical science, from there she taught a special course, adventures in super-computing at Grundy County High School and CCCHS under a grant from the Department of Energy. This would later become one of Ray’s favorite memories. “The original grant actually gave me the opportunity to be among the first 15 Classrooms in the state of Tennessee to have internet access. This was several years prior to the big push in Tennessee to get all classrooms connected, so it was a very unique experience for me to have my students researching communicating with people online at a time when we didn’t even have internet browsers as we think of them today. At that time searching and researching online was entirely text based. I have a vivid memory of coming back after Christmas one year when I had attended a conference and received a small disk with a computer program on it called Netscape.  Of course, we know that to be a web browser today but at the time we were so excited to be able to see pictures and video and hear sound online. That connectivity allowed my high school students to interact on a regular basis with scientists and researchers and computer programmers from all across the country at universities and national laboratories.”

Not only did Ray love teaching, but she loved sponsoring and maintaining clubs as well. Throughout her 31 years , there were only five of which she was not sponsoring a club or team. Mrs. Ray’s best advice for aspiring teachers is to “focus on learning both the art and science of teaching. No matter the course or grade, there are teaching strategies and techniques that can be learned, but there is also an aspect of teaching that is intangible. Everyone has something different they can bring to their students. You must care about kids and want what’s best for them.”

Mrs. Ray will be missed dearly and we, as the CCCHS family, wish her the best of luck.