Craven County Schools names Christian Martin Beginning Teacher of the Year for 2024–25

Christian Martin, introduced as Craven County Schools’ Beginning Teacher of the Year for 2024–25, told a student interviewer that the most rewarding part of teaching is watching students grow.

Martin, a second‑year social studies teacher, credited a high school teacher cadet program and a teacher he named Mrs. Wallace for shaping his decision to enter the profession. “She was one of my high school teachers. She actually taught teacher cadet, which was a course for people who might be interested in teaching, and so I had the opportunity to go into different schools, including elementary and middle where I kind of fell in love with teaching middle school,” Martin said.

Why it matters: School recognition programs can highlight early‑career educators and provide examples for recruitment and retention in districts that say they need more teachers. In the interview, Martin described both the professional rewards and the everyday challenges of classroom work.

Martin said one of the key lessons he has learned in his second year is the importance of continual reflection and the willingness to be proven wrong as part of learning to teach. “It being my second year, one of the most important lessons would probably be that it’s okay to be wrong,” he said, calling teaching “a constant opportunity to reflect.”

He described the most rewarding part of the job as seeing measurable growth in students’ academics and maturity. “Even now… I’ve seen growth from August through December not only in terms of academics and your reading and writing, but just seeing how you all have grown in your maturity,” Martin said. He gave an example of former students checking in outside school and updating him on their progress in high school.

Martin also spelled out classroom challenges: the many responsibilities teachers carry and the difficulty of meeting every student’s needs. “You also have to constantly kind of be on, so even if you may not be feeling 100%, you still want to show up and give your all,” he said.

Asked what advice he would offer beginning teachers, Martin urged reflection, patience and passion. He recommended accepting mistakes as part of learning, making concrete adjustments after a lesson that did not go as planned, and enjoying the time with students because it passes quickly. “For new people who are considering going into teaching, I would probably say… if you’re passionate about it, right, then definitely pursue it,” he said.

Martin said he hopes students leave his class with an appreciation for education and a sense that they have an advocate in him. “I want them to know… they should always feel supported. They have somebody in the classroom who is… always my student at heart,” he said.

The interview was conducted by student Braxton Esmouth, who identified Martin at the outset as the district’s beginning teacher of the year for 2024–25. No formal board action, vote or policy change was recorded during the segment.

Details: Martin said he teaches social studies and that his classroom includes live classroom fish that students sometimes joke about him maintaining. He noted a prior interest in animal‑related careers but said teaching remained his chosen profession.