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Audrey Reed Receives Sadler Award at Mississippi College Spring Commencement


Mississippi College elementary education graduate Audrey Reed of Brandon receives the Sadler Award at the university's Spring 2014 commencement on May 10.

Audrey Reed’s perfect classroom performance at Mississippi College prepared her to join the teaching profession.

As an elementary education major at the Baptist-affiliated university, the 22-year-old Brandon resident felt blessed to be guided by caring professors in the School of Education.

“They taught us how we can share our faith with our students,” Audrey said. “I loved the small student/teacher ratio and getting to know my teachers and classmates rather well. I made a lot of friends.”

With a 4.0 average the past two years at Mississippi College after earning her associate of arts degree in May 2011 at Hinds Community College, Reed received the Sadler Scholarship Award at the university’s commencement on May 10.

Dr. William O. Sadler, a 1929 MC graduate and longtime biology professor at the Christian university, established the award. The honor goes to a student with the highest grade point average the past two years who graduated from a community college. Audrey is among a growing pool of students earning Hinds degrees and enrolling at nearby Mississippi College.

“Audrey is an outstanding student with a passion for helping children learn,” says Cindy Melton, who chairs the Teacher Education and Leadership Department on the Clinton campus. “She sees the classroom as her mission field and views teaching as her area of ministry. We are very proud of her work and of her commitment to the profession of teaching.”

Homeschooled before she began taking classes at the Hinds campus in Pearl, Audrey is the daughter of Raymond and Wendy Reed of Brandon. Her mom is a school teacher and father is a computer consultant with the tax assessor’s office. “I want to teach kids the way I was taught.”

This summer, Audrey will travel to Northern Asia to teach children at an international school over the next 11 months. She served as a teacher in East Asia last summer. In addition, she’s worked with kids as a pre-school teacher/childcare worker at Pinelake Church and English instructor at Morrison Heights Baptist Church in Clinton. She’s been active with the Baptist Student Union at Mississippi College.

Winning the Sadler award as thousands in the audience looked on at the A.E. Wood Coliseum that Saturday morning was quite an unexpected tribute, Reed said. “I was very surprised,” she said. “I was very blessed, honored and humbled.”