Being the former wife of a backstage theater worker meant moving around a lot. Thus, Ms. Lindsey Parrish taught a variety of subjects like 6th grade World History in Memphis, Tennessee; Civics in Murray, Utah; 7th grade Language Arts in Wabash, Indiana; and English as a Second Language in Hattiesburg, Mississippi.

Her high school science teacher, Mr. Boyd inspired Ms. Parrish to become a teacher, so she earned a Bachelor’s in Philosophy and a Masters in American Studies from the University of Memphis.

“Back in the late 1990s, we used to go blow things up in the bus yard,” Ms. Parrish said. “He would prep the reactants, and we would learn about the reaction that was about to happen. Then, we would make predictions on what we thought would happen. If we were putting on our goggles and marching out to the bus yard, the answer was always ‘KABOOM!’”

Ms. Parrish likes how Kimmons has a space where every kid fits.

“I think that is different from other schools I have worked within,” Ms. Parrish said.

Getting derailed by questions and curiosity is Ms. Parrish’s biggest challenges as a teacher.

“Questions are a natural part of loving Science, but because of the way Science specifically is, it can lead to side subjects,” Ms. Parrish said. “If you ask a question about factoring a polynomial in Math, the tangents are limited by the subject matter. In Science, they just keep going if you are doing it right. If you really like being curious and knowing, it is easy to get off task.”

One surprising fact about Ms. Parrish is that, at age fifteen, she attended Lycée Scheurer Kestner as an exchange student in Thann, France.

“My parents initially said no, but I sold $5,000 or so in candy bars and that covered most of the trip,” Ms. Parrish said. “We hosted students for two weeks in America, and then they hosted us in France. Since I’d had four years of French, I was pretty fluent and could ask for anything and have conversations. Academic language is really different though, and it is hard to explain how tired it makes you to do school in another language. School in France was really different because students were already doing more block schedules as if they were in college. School lunch was amazing because it was like eating at a nice restaurant. They asked me to stay and complete high school in France, but my parents said ‘no,’ so I returned and graduated from Magnolia, Arkansas.

Outside of school, Ms. Parrish raises her two girls.

“We like to travel and enjoy eating at new places,” Ms. Parrish said. “I’ve been camping more with friends lately.”