Sallie Senseney

Mountain Heritage High School, Yancey County Schools

Sallie Senseney has taught Biology, AP Biology, and Earth Science at Mountain Heritage High School since 2010.  She returned to MHHS, her home high school, after earning an undergraduate degree in biology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.  At UNC, she was a Burroughs Wellcome Fund Scholar in the UNC-BEST program.  She earned her National Board Certification in 2014 and a master’s degree in biology from Clemson University in 2017.

In the classroom, Sallie focuses on building relationships with her students in order to make science content relevant to them.  She utilizes hands-on teaching strategies to engage students and uses her school’s rural campus to study concepts like biodiversity, invasive species, and water quality.  Sallie has been recognized for excellence in teaching by Yancey County Schools and is the 2018-2019 Mountain Heritage High School Teacher of the Year.

Sallie is excited to use the Career Award to create an Innovation Lab at her school, strengthen science instruction by providing professional development to K-12 teachers in Yancey County Schools, and inte