Three outstanding teachers at Homewood-Flossmoor High School have been nominated for the Teacher of the Year Award presented by the Illinois State Board of Education.

The outstanding teacher nominees are Crystal Perez, a special education teacher in the English Department, Kanoa Mulling, an English teacher, and Steve Sifner, music teacher and Viking Choir director. They were nominated for this honor by their students.

They will be recognized at an ISBE banquet in spring.

Crystal Perez

Crystal Perez has been teaching for 14 years, the last five at H-F. As a special education teacher she is imbedded into an English classroom working alongside the teacher. “It’s kind of a two-for-one, so you can give all the kids that extra support that they need to be successful,” she explained. She also teaches English/American Lit to juniors in small group sections.

Perez, a graduate of Bloom High School in Chicago Heights, said her teachers inspired her to go into teaching. She remembers her junior year teacher, Mr. Mallott, who entered teaching as a second career. “He brought a different life to the classroom. He inspired me.”

Kanoa Mulling

Kanoa Mulling is an H-F graduate who went to Princeton University to study math, before making a switch to English. 

“I imagined myself teaching, and I was much more excited about conversations I’d have in English. I thought back to my school days with Mr. Brown. My AP English and Composition class with him was my favorite class.”

Mulling has been teaching English at H-F the past eight years. He said the revised English curriculum is helping students become better writers starting freshman year. 

“The first unit of the year we’re analyzing fiction and writing as a way to kind of open their eyes to the choices that writers make and to set them up to tell their own stories,” Mulling said.

He also is the speech coach and co-directs speech interpretation for competition. He said he draws inspiration from now retired H-F teacher Janine Stromer.

Steve Sifner

For the past seven years, Steve Sifner has been the choir director at H-F. 

“I’m doing what I always wanted to do,” Sifner said.

He happily remembers the hours he spent in the Viking Choir room with teacher Michael Rugen.

“I wanted to be a high school choir director since I was a high school student in Mr. Rugen’s class,” he said. His idea of a college major in computer engineering went out the window when he was inspired by that teacher. “He was just very good at bringing people together.”

As an H-F student, Sifner was in Viking Choir; he was the choir’s student conductor; he was selected for Illinois All-State Choir. “I had very rich experiences in my time at H-F,” he recalled. 

He earned his music degree at Indiana University and taught high school in the Austin, Texas, area before coming back to H-F, taking over the Viking choir director’s position when his former teacher retired.