In today’s episode, we interview one of our listeners and rural high school teachers, Rachael Straughn, from Russell County High School in Seale, Alabama. In this episode, Rachael shares her educational journey and narrative. Rachael talks about her childhood dream of being a broadcast meteorologist and storm chaser. She worked hard to be a chief meteorologist on television within a lake effect snow area and achieved her dream at age 25. While in that role, she hosted school learning opportunities to teach students about meteorology and emergency preparedness. While teaching the evening news, Rachael also served as a substitute teacher to connect with the classroom. After achieving her life goal of being a meteorologist, she shifted her career to be a teacher. We discussed the geographical differences in rural education. Rachael talked about her experiences teaching in rural Alabama and the benefits of this experience. This episode shows the amazing job all our teachers are doing in rural education. Rachael Straughn is a chemistry teacher at Russell County High School in Seale, Alabama and a doctoral student in education leadership at Valdosta State University. She has her M.S. Ed from Utica University and her Bachelors in Meteorology from Iowa State University. She has taught middle and high school science in upstate NY and Columbus, Georgia. Before becoming a teacher, she was a broadcast meteorologist in Nebraska, South Carolina, California and upstate New York. She is happily married to her husband Corey, who serves in the US Army and they have a one year old son Milo. In her limited free time, she loves to sew, read or listen to audiobooks and she is a Jeopardy superfan! Twitter- @SchoolhouseRach TikTok- @mrs.straughn LinkedIn- Rachael Straughn