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Apollo Beach Teacher Retires After 40 Years

Tribune photo by LOIS KINDLE

Erna Frazier works with her students during one of her final days as a teacher. She is retiring after 40 years in the classroom.

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By LOIS KINDLE The Tampa Tribune

The Tampa Tribune

Published: June 4, 2008

APOLLO BEACH - After 40 years in the classroom, Erna Frazier is ready to retire Thursday. But you would never know it watching her with her students.

Pleasant and soft-spoken, the Apollo Beach Elementary School teacher doesn't need to raise her voice to grab their attention, said her teaching partner, Shari Storch. "She has the look - you know, the one your mother used to give you.

"Mrs. Frazier is the cream of the crop and deserves the best life has to offer," Storch said. "There are so many things I have learned from watching her teach. I feel truly blessed to have had the privilege of working alongside her this year. Her students have been blessed as well to have such an incredible teacher. ... We will certainly miss her around here."

"Erna Frazier is a star teacher," said Principal Jaime Gerding. "She is highly respected for her professionalism, dedication and her passion for education. She is always positive, always smiling and always willing to do whatever it takes to make sure each child in her class is successful.

"She is a model for all of us, and she will be dearly missed."

Children feel the same way.

"I'm sad she's leaving," said fourth-grader Ashley Rothenbush. "She's a really, really good teacher, and she's fun to be around. I've known her since I was in kindergarten."

Frazier, 63, came to Apollo Beach Elementary when it opened in 1982. Before that, she taught for seven years at Cleveland Elementary and Epiphany Christian schools in Tampa and also did a two-year stint as a substitute teacher. Before moving to Tampa in the early 1970s, she taught school in Arkansas for five years.

She was named Apollo Beach Elementary School's Teacher of the Year in 1993.

Raised in the tiny community of Gould, Ark., Frazier graduated from high school in 1961. She earned a bachelor's degree in business at Philander Smith College in Little Rock in 1965.

When she arrived in Florida, Hillsborough County teachers were on strike. So she immediately took a substitute teaching position and then went full time at Epiphany.

Frazier and her husband, Harold, a retired engineer, live in Riverview. One reason she is retiring, she said, is to spend more time with him. But she also wants to learn to play the piano, travel and write a children's book. And she will continue to volunteer at First Baptist Church of Progress Village, where she is a member.

The couple have two adult daughters, Lysaundra Solomon and Jennifer Brown, and two grandchildren, Auriel, 9, and Daven, 3.

"I'm going to miss teaching," Frazier said. "It has been my life for so long.

"Mostly, I'll miss the children. They keep me grounded on what's important in life. They see things as they really are."

Frazier said she will also miss the collaboration and fellowship with her colleagues.

"It's kind of bittersweet," she said. "I know it's time to leave, though, while I still have my health."

During the 40 years Frazier has taught second through fourth grades and high school, there have been changes.

The children have the same bright, shiny faces and are eager for learning experiences," she said. "They're still like sponges."

What's different, she said, are the requirements, techniques and strategies used in today's classrooms.

"Children have so many distractions now," she said. "It's more challenging to grab their attention."

But apparently not for Erna Frazier. After all, she has "the look."

GET TO KNOW

WHO: Erna Frazier

AGE: 63

WHAT: Fourth-grade teacher

WHERE: Apollo Beach Elementary School

EXPERIENCE: 40 years in the classroom

PERSONAL: Married; two daughters and two grandchildren

RESIDENCE: Riverview

Reporter Lois Kindle can be reached at (813) 865-1553 or lkindle@tampatrib.com.

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