MEET JANE STUBBS, SPEECH THERAPIST AT THE CHAFFEE AND DELTA SCHOOLS

CHAFFEE - June Stubbs entered the teaching profession through a "non-traditional" route.

"When my son started school, I decided to go to college," she explained. "I wanted to be a teacher because I liked children and I felt that I would enjoy working with them.

"I started college 15 years after graduating from high school. At that time, there were few "non-traditional" students at Southeast Missouri State University."

Stubbs is a speech therapy teacher for three days a week at Chaffee R-2 School and for two days a week at Delta R-5 School. She works with students in kindergarten through grade 12. She has taught for the last 23 years, the first three years in a second grade classroom.

She received both of her degrees from Southeast; a bachelors degree in speech correction and elementary education, and a masters degree in elementary education.

Stubbs holds her classes in a van.

"Many times the little children think the van is my home," she said.

"They want to know where I sleep and they want to see my bed."

The most gratifying part of her job is seeing a child with a severe speech problem improve enough to be understood by others.

"Many of the children are in my class for several years, and I get to know them well," Stubbs said. "I become attached to them and I'm happy that they improve enough to be dismissed. However, I hate to lose them."

She feels the greatest challenge in education is in keeping students interested in the classroom.

"Children are exposed to a lot, and they learn a lot from television," she said. "A teacher has to be very innovative in her teaching to keep the children interested."

She and her husband, Gene, have a son, Neil, who lives in St. Louis with his wife, Jeanette, and daughter, Emily Jean.

Stubbs likes to work in the yard, grow flowers, and enjoy the antics of her two dogs, Cindy, a poodle, and Candy, a terrier.