Looking after younger children has always come naturally to Riley Edwards. At family gatherings, the high school junior often can be found surrounded by her, well, juniors.
“Every time I was at a family event, I would always go play with the little cousins and watch them,” she said in a recent phone interview.
That nurturing trait not only gave those kids’ parents a break — it also led to Riley getting attention on a statewide stage.
Earlier this month, Gov. Glenn Youngkin mentioned the 16-year-old’s participation in a future educators program at Germanna Community College in his State of the Commonwealth speech.
“After she graduates from the Future Educators Academy next year, Riley will have her associate’s degree in early education at no cost to her,” Youngkin said in the Jan. 13 speech. “She wants to become an elementary school teacher and then guidance counselor back home in Culpeper. Riley, we look forward to you teaching and inspiring our next generation.”
Riley was chosen after the governor’s office reached out to Culpeper schools Superintendent Anthony Brads. According to Riley’s mother, Chloe Edwards, Brads has been a huge advocate for the Future Educators program. And he knew Riley because Chloe works in human resources for the school division.
Not long after Youngkin’s speech, friends from Riley’s home school, Culpeper County High, and Germanna began texting her about her newfound fame, she said.
How did she feel about that?
“I don’t know,” she said. “It was really cool, I guess, because a lot of my classmates saw it because there were a lot of posts about it.”
Hobnobbing with the governor and dignitaries such as Secretary of Education Aimee Rogstad Guidera in Richmond was a little nerve-racking, too, Riley admitted.
“Especially meeting all these people, especially from the governor’s office, which is so important,” she said. “It was scary.”
The Future Educators Academy is a “College Partnership Laboratory School,” or “lab school,” which the state Education Department defines as being designed to stimulate the development of innovative education programs.
Designed to cultivate the next generation of teachers, it’s a joint venture among Germanna, Laurel Ridge Community College, local school divisions, James Madison University, and the University of Mary Washington.
The program, which is in its first year, features 17 students who spend half of each day at Germanna’s Daniel Technology Center and half at their home school. When Riley graduates next year, she will receive her high school diploma as well as an associate’s degree.
Next, she said she plans to get a bachelor’s degree. Then, as part of the Future Educators Academy, she’ll agree to come back to Culpeper to teach for two years.
Eventually, she wants to get a master’s degree to work as a guidance counselor.
In addition to enjoying being around younger relatives, Riley came to the idea of being a teacher because it was a family tradition. Her mother, for example, worked in special education before transitioning to the business side of the school system.
“A lot of my family members have been teachers, and so I’ve always kind of grown up with women around me being teachers, and that’s always kind of something I’ve looked up to,” Riley said.
Riley is the youngest of three children in the Edwards family, and her sister, Logan, did a similar accelerated program through Germanna. Logan Edwards is now a senior at Mary Washington.
Chloe Edwards said she wasn’t sure Riley would want to follow in those footsteps until word of the Future Educators Academy came up.
“So we’re very proud of her that she wants to do that,” Chloe Edwards said. “That she’s taking her future and her future interest and she’s showing such maturity in wanting to pursue this and taking on the extra work because they have, I mean, six classes, seven classes that they have to worry about all year long when most students only have four at a time that they have to worry about.”
