PORT ST. LUCIE PEOPLE
The AWARD-WINNING
TEACHER
When Nardi Routten was just a little
girl, she already knew she wanted
to be a teacher. “I would line up
my stuffed animals and pretend
to teach them,” says Routten, 52, who was
recently awarded a $25,000 Milken Educator
Award in January for her excellence in teaching
fourth-graders at Frances K. Sweet Elementary
School in Fort Pierce. Dr. Jane Foley, senior vice
president of the Milken Family Foundation,
presented the award, and first lady Ann Scott
and Commissioner of Education Pam Stewart
were there to congratulate Routten.
The award came as a complete surprise to
Routten, who like the rest of the staff at Frances
K. Sweet, was only told that an assembly would
be held that Friday because the school was
being awarded an A for the 14th year in a row.
But it turned out to be much more than that for
Routten, who was the only Florida teacher to
receive the award this year. “I was shocked,”
she says. “Nothing like this has ever happened
to me before.”
The timing couldn’t be more perfect. Routten
is finishing up a master’s degree in her favorite
subject ― reading ― and could use the money
for tuition. She decided to get her master’s in
reading because it was a subject that challenged
her when she was a child. “When I was in
grade school I struggled with comprehension,
and no one at the time taught me how to do
it, and that’s why I’m getting my master’s in
reading,” she says. “I’m already incorporating
strategies I’m learning with my kids — that’s
what I call my students.”
Her desire to help students, particularly
those who are struggling, was also strongly
influenced by one of her high school teachers.
“She was a language arts teacher and in charge
of the newspaper. I was painfully shy, and if I
had to say anything I turned beet red, and she
helped me overcome that by helping me to
interview people,” says Routten. “She took me
under her wing and she saw something in me
that I didn’t see. She’s one of my inspirations
to teach, and to try and find something in my
students that they don’t think they can do but I
do, and bring that out in them.”
Helping Routten celebrate her much-deserved
award was her husband of 31 years,
Mark, and her 18-year-old son, Austin, a senior
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Port St. Lucie Magazine
ED DRONDOSKI
Nardi Routten, a fourth-grade teacher at Frances K. Sweet, was really surprised when recently
awarded a $25,000 Milken Educator Award.
BY SIOBHAN FITZPATRICK AUSTIN