This Spring, University of Arizona Athletics continues their tradition of honoring a grade school teacher in Southern Arizona.
One of nine worthy nominees will be given the title of Teacher of the Year; we want you to meet all of this year’s candidates.
In this visit, we meet Michelle Tozer and joined her 10th grade Biology class at Empire High School.
At one point in class, it was time to test our taste buds. “You ever have cilantro before?” Tozer asked one of her students. “You might not thank me in just a little bit.”
Mrs. Tozer hands out a sprig of cilantro to each of her sophomores to see if they have the gene mutation that makes this herb taste like soap. “We can all have a piece of the same thing to eat,” she tells the students, “but each one of us is going to experience it a little different, and a lot of that does come down to our genes.”
Early in her career, Tozer said, she knew she wanted to teach. She got her start in a middle-school classroom on a Tucson Unified School District campus, but not long after, she found an even bigger opportunity.