Overcome with emotion, Tigervision adviser Charles Aldridge wipes away tears of joy as he watches a video of former students, colleagues, and friends congratulating him on being named the Student Television Network’s Teacher of the Year for 2024.
On May 7, 2024, Tigervision held a party to celebrate Aldridge’s winning the STN Teacher of the Year award for the 2023-2024 school year. STN supports and encourages scholastic broadcasting and provides a forum for teachers to share ideas and learn from industry professionals.
“I’m still in disbelief, I don’t believe it happened. I really don’t feel like I’m worthy of such a big award,” Aldridge said. “So, to think of some of the other teachers that have received this award, to think that I’m even anywhere near that caliber warms my heart.”
Many thoughts rushed through Aldridge’s head when he walked into his surprise celebration. His family and friends arranged a gathering in his honor upon learning of his win where his students were in attendance.
“[I felt like I saw] 100 people when I walked into my classroom. My first thought was confusion because I knew it wasn’t my birthday. But within a few seconds, I saw their banner. I had known a week earlier that I was nominated but I didn’t think that this could happen in a million years,” Aldridge said. “Within a few minutes I also realized oh dang, I gotta speak in front of 3000 students next year. I can’t do that.”
Aldridge’s daughter, Victoria Pearcy, gathered videos of people thanking him for impacting their lives.
“I found out three days before his reveal that he had won. I searched my Facebook for hours for former students, parents and colleagues of Mr. A to send in a congratulations message,” Pearcy said. “I received an overwhelming number of videos. It was just another reminder of how loved he is.”
“When I saw the video, I cried. I just couldn’t believe seeing some of my past students that I have cherished relationships with for so many years. A few of them were here when I first came to Texas High, which would have been 24 years ago. I just couldn’t believe to see them in a video. That was very heartfelt. That really was the highlight of my day was watching my past students,” Aldridge said.
Aldridge has been a teacher for 30 years and has had the opportunity to shape many lives. Teachers often question what impact they are making within their careers, Aldrige received his answer from his former students.
“Over the years, I’ve always asked myself, am I being successful? Am I doing this right? But it’s for the kids and that’s always been the answer. Years later, seeing the results of some of the successes [with] past students, now working in the field makes me feels good to see their accomplishments,” Aldridge said.
The anchoring and networking it takes to be successful in broadcast allows many students to gain confidence in themselves that they can carry throughout their lives.“If I never joined TigerVision, I wouldn’t really know what I would want to do, or maybe I would want to [follow a] completely different career path.”
“Freshman year, I was really shy and quiet. I did not want anything to do with being in front of a camera, and now fast forward to senior year I anchor and I love doing it because of this program,” TigerVision president Liliana Sanchez said. “In the four years that I’ve been in TigerVision, I’ve grown so much and Mr.A has helped with that.”
The skills students gain in Aldridge’s program can be taken with them throughout life.
“I’m going to be going into communications in college because of TigerVision,” Sanchez said.
His students highly regard Aldridge. They believe in his accomplishments almost as much as he believes in his abilities.
“He finally got what he deserved. He’s been in this career field his whole life basically, and he finally got something he could be proud of,” sophomore Bree Burns said. “He helped start STN, so this is something really big for him.”
Stacy Mayo has known Aldridge for many years from their shared involvement in the community. To celebrate his accomplishments, she helped organize this party along with Aldridge’s children.
“I’ve known Mr. A for a very long time now, and I know he’s always been so involved with his students, in and outside of the classroom. When my son David became a freshman last year, he really took him under his wing, which meant the world to me,” Mayo said. “From that, I was able to get to know him even more, and then get to know the students and realize just what an impact he makes.”
Aldridge’s former students have the capacity to come back and assist him as a peer through the TigerVision program.
“When I was a student, I really felt like [TigerVision] was the perfect storm. We had a lot of students that were really passionate about that. I don’t think they would have had the same passion if it weren’t for Mr. A. He obviously instilled a passion in me for me to want to come back and work with him and work in the tiger vision classroom,” TigerVision assistant Raelyn Ligon said. “Since I’ve been here, I’ve seen that same kind of fire be lit in a lot of our seniors this year and some of our underclassmen. I really see a lot of potential, and I know that the interest was instilled in them because of Mr. A’s teaching.”
