Ashley Lucot plans to continue helping students and their families advocate for their child with special needs, but also to teach those students how to advocate for themselves.
“My goal is to definitely continue working…with students with special needs,” she said.
Lucot strives to mix “the effective with the academics” and shape the person as a whole, rather than as a piece.
“It’s rewarding whenever you can kind of have a celebratory meeting and…help that student and that family see that child’s potential,” she said, adding, “because a lot of times in special ed there’s a lot of focus on the weaknesses, so I’m just really inspired to focus on their strengths, and to help them in that way.”
Lucot now teaches special education at Givhans Alternative Program. This is her first year at the school; she was previously a special education teacher for three years at Summerville Elementary.
Lucot is originally from Pittsburgh. She went to Clarion University and studied early childhood and special education. She has a master’s in education with a reading specialist concentration, also through Clarion.
Lucot said she wanted to become a teacher to make a difference.
“I feel like there’s not too many other careers where you can work so closely with the future of America,” she said. “So I really wanted to…inspire kids to be better versions of themselves, so teaching seemed like the best route for me to go.”
Lucot came to South Carolina after she and a friend, who is also a teacher in the district, sought out a new place to move to start fresh after graduation. They found that Dorchester District Two was doing a recruitment fair, and they ended up making the move soon after.
Lucot said her best experience teaching is seeing students succeed and finding the best version of themselves.
“It’s really exciting to see them overcome some obstacles that they’ve had,” she said. “I feel like some of the worst (times) is when kids don’t feel like they are good enough and they don’t feel like they are worthy of going to college or having a good job, and feeling like dropping out would be easier. So that’s really hard trying to get them to be inspired to continue to be the best version of themselves.”
Lucot said learning about some of their home lives and background also makes it difficult, but it also helps her to better understand them as a person and how to modify her teaching is a way that is more personalized for them.
She said her students start each class with acknowledging the good things and once a week she discusses future goals with them.
“I am finding that when they look beyond their present situation, that they see more into the future and they learn that they need to just focus on getting through these years of schooling and then they can go to whatever they feel like they’re interested in doing,” she said.
One thing Lucot has helped put into place this year is the STING Homeroom (“sting” stands for the school’s expectations, and is a play off the school mascot, the yellow jackets); when new students transition into Givhans they go to her to understand the expectations, policies and procedures of the school.
Her favorite thing about Givhans is their new program, Capturing Kids’ Hearts, which she described as a big piece of the school digging into the personalized learning and motivating the students from inside-out.
“I find that it really helps build rapport with the kids and helps them just to understand that we care about them, and that we respect them, and it helps them to do the same for us,” she said. “It’s just been a really, really awesome program and I feel like we are really moving forward with it.”
Lucot lives in West Ashley. She lives with her friends Michelle Klinger, a special education teacher at Gregg Middle, and Nick Siemers, an ABA therapist for Easterseals.
Lucot enjoys hiking, going to the beach, traveling, hanging out with friends, visiting with family and spending time with her dog, Kobie, a male 5-year-old Rottweiler/golden retriever.
Her boyfriend, Todd Garren, lives in Hendersonville, North Carolina. They enjoy hiking, going to the beach, trying new restaurants and watching Clemson football.
Her life goal is to be successful in her career and eventually start her own family.
Lucot said she thinks it is important for others to realize children choose to come to Givhans Alternative Program because they want a more personalized program in a smaller environment.
“So it kind of helps us create a more personalized academic setting for students, and for students who are expelled and sent to us, it gives them a second chance,” she said.
She said her goal with the STING Homeroom is to explain to the student that it is a fresh start.
“These kids are amazing and we have some really talented kids – really, really smart kids and kids that are really going to go far, and all of them have that ability to do so,” she said.
