Technology Teachers of the Year

High School Technology Teachers of the Year Steffan Ledgerwood and Chris Winikka pose with High School Technology Student of the Year, Edward Lam, at the TAO Awards Event

Liberty’s Steffan Ledgerwood and Century’s Chris Winikka each took home a TechStart High School Technology Teacher of the Year award at the Technology Association of Oregon’s 41st Annual Awards event in May. The award recognizes teacher excellence, outreach to underserved communities, and collaboration with other educators. It also comes with a $1,000 cash stipend for the classroom to spend on tech education materials including hardware, software, services, or curriculum. 

Here is some information from the press release about each of them. 

Steffan Ledgerwood has been a teacher for 25 years and is an advocate for computer science and technology education through his coursework and work with youth robotics. Ledgerwood teaches math classes and developed curriculum for several new Engineering and Computer Science Pathway courses based on high school and collegiate models. He works with FIRST Robotics, acting as the lead mentor for First Tech Challenge (FTC) and First Robotics Competition (FRC) teams. His AEMBOT FRC robotics team won the Pacific Northwest Championship and finished fourth in their division in international competition. He also guides students through the ACE Mentor Program and Northwest Science Expo, having supported several students to compete in the International Science and Engineering Fair. He recently began engaging with Oregon MESA in hopes of connecting more minority students with Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM).

Chris Winikka has taught at Century High School in Hillsboro, Oregon for 26 years and is an extraordinary advocate for computer science and a leader in computer science and technology education.  Winikka collaborated with Terry Alexander to adopt five new courses at the Hillsboro School District including three levels of game design. Their creative computing, and applied computing courses implement the Oregon Exploring Computer Science (ECS) curriculum designed to develop students' ability to think critically and solve problems using computational tools and concepts.

Winikka is past President of the Oregon Computer Science Teachers Association (OCSTA). Winikka states, “Working with OCSTA helped me from the beginning of my teaching career by learning from other teachers and providing opportunities for collaboration. I completed the Exploring Computer Science teacher training to improve my teaching practices to increase diversity and provide relevant and engaging experiences for the non-traditional student. I find the practices to have been transformative to my entire program, and it led me to get two new CS courses approved by our district. I also participate in the Portland Area Career Technical Education Consortium (PACTEC) which has allowed me to improve my CTE courses and provide dual credit opportunities for my students.”

For the past 11 years, Winikka has acted as the after-school Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math (STEAM) club coach at Century High School. Through the STEAM program, he has coached five different clubs including Robotics (FTC), MESA, Software Entrepreneurs Club, Video Game Design club, and Makerspace Clubs as well as promoting and supporting other after school STEAM-based programs run by other teachers.

Congratulations and way to go, Steffan and Chris! You make us Proud to be HSD!