In the military, Nadia Morris-Mitchell learned valuable life skills like accountability and self-reliance. Now she hopes to teach those same skills to her eighth-grade students.
The former U.S. Navy Seabee and Air National Guardsman just began her career as a special education teacher for Syracuse City Schools, as part of Syracuse University’s Baldanza Fellows program.
Growing up in Syracuse, Morris-Mitchell didn’t know what she wanted to do, but she knew what she didn’t want.
“I graduated high school in 2005, and it was the beginning of the opioid epidemic. My best friend was pregnant at 18. My mother was a widow with three children, and I didn’t want to put any more financial burden on her, if I could help it. So, I was like, ‘Get me out of Syracuse,’” Morris-Mitchell recalled.
Morris-Mitchell enlisted in the Navy, operating heavy equipment for the Seabees. She was stationed in Mississippi and California before being deployed to Guam. Later, as part of the Navy Reserves, she supported combat operations in Afghanistan.
In 2017, she transitioned to the New York Air National Guard’s 174th Attack Wing, which is responsible for protecting service members from illness and environmental hazards during deployment.
“It’s kind of what the CDC would do, but for the military population on that base,” Morris-Mitchell said. “We are basically getting in all the nooks and corners to make sure everything is safe.”
Caption: Nadia Morris-Mitchell.
Caption: Nadia Morris-Mitchell.
Morris-Mitchell found she liked getting to know her fellow service members, and she took pride in keeping them safe and healthy. She also had a knack for talking to people about complex things in a way that they could understand.
She enrolled part-time at Syracuse University, where she earned her bachelor's degree in creative leadership. When she was approached about the Baldanza Fellows program, an intensive 15-month teacher preparation program that helps place educators in underrepresented K-12 schools, she thought she might be a good candidate. “I have family members who were teachers,” she said. “I've always been told that I have more patience than most, and kids just like me.”
She graduated in August and began teaching in September, in a self-contained 12:1:1 eighth-grade classroom at Clary Middle School on Syracuse’s south side.
The small school is just 10 miles from where Morris-Mitchell grew up, but resource disparities between city schools and the suburban schools can sometimes make it feel like a different world.
Mitchell-Morris is mindful that her students confront a unique set of challenges. “I always tell people, you know, we don't know their life at home.”
Syracuse has one of the nation’s highest rates of child poverty, and at Clary Middle School, 94 percent of students are economically disadvantaged, and 17 percent are homeless.
Students in her classroom contend with a variety of diagnoses, from learning disabilities to autism and behavior problems. “I like that every day is different. Nothing is like Groundhog’s Day. You kind of have to expect the unexpected,” she said.
Her time in the military taught her how to build structure and routine even amid chaos, and she has been laying that foundation with her students since the first day of school.
“It’s about setting expectations, good follow-through and holding them accountable,” she said. “They’re not always used to that. Some days they might get mad, but they're right back at my side, sooner or later, apologizing and whatnot.”
Morris-Mitchell will retire from the military in 2029, but she said teaching has given her a new way to serve her community. “I definitely wanted something with purpose,” she said. “I feel like there's a lot of positive potential if I can get through to these younger students.”