When Andy Smith had a hole in his cup, he met a group of students who helped fill him back up and give him a new direction. Smith, an adaptive PE teacher and Mindset trainer with Exceptional Children’s Services, sets his kids up for small victories and lifelong success.
Smith graduated from Starr’s Mill High, parlaying his football talent into a scholarship to play at the University of Memphis where he was an all-conference player. After college, he was using his geography degree mapping cell phone coverage. His high school sweetheart had joined him in Memphis. They were getting married and kept striking out looking at houses.
“What if we just move home?” he asked.
They were discussing it when the phone rang. It was one of his old high school coaches calling to see if he would be interested in trying out coaching.
“Something’s guiding us home, and it’s time for me to head that way,” he thought.
He could’ve followed much of his family into a trade path, but he got interested in teaching early thanks to his mother. She was working on her elementary education degree, and he go to school with her, joking that he was the test subject for class.
“I got to watch my mom start as an educator and see the impact she had with kids,” he remembered. “We’d go out in the community and see the kids come up and talk to her. At that age, being young and growing up, that inspired me.”
An experience from a down time in his life ended up shaping his career trajectory. Early in his senior year of high school, his father passed away suddenly from a heart attack. A chance to volunteer at a local Special Olympics shined a much-needed light.
“Man, they lift you up. It was such a cup-filling experience.”
He enjoyed it so much, he volunteered to help with the summer games.
“That really was my first exposure, and it totally changed my perspective,” he said. “It’s definitely a population that I wanted to have a part of my life.”
Fast-forward and he was teaching in our school system when his brother, who he was very close to, was killed in a tragic work accident. Smith was knocked down when the opportunity to lead adaptive PE came open.
“I wasn’t just empty, I had a hole punched in the bottom of my glass. I was all the way down,” he said. “Working within this world with Exceptional Children’s (Services) and working with the students I work with, started to patch that cup up.”
Smith and his students grew together, making each other better.
“It went from a hole to a patch and small leak and then, as life went on and I was able to pour into work and and working with these kids, they poured into me in turn and helped repair that and fill that back up,” he said. “My cup is full and overflowing, and now I can help others.”
He has a passion for making PE more accessible and his students more active. He’s always tinkering in what he jokes is his mad scientist lab to find ways to help them participate. One such creation is a button that students trigger to launch a ball so they can compete at Special Olympics.
As much as the students love it, it also means the world to the parents.
“For the first time with an event, their kid is doing it. It’s not somebody standing beside them and shooting the basketball. It’s not somebody hand over hand,” he said. “Their student independently pushes (the button) and it shoots. Everybody lights up. Everybody loves it. It’s awesome to see and be part of.”
So many teachers and coaches made his education fulfilling, and he wants to pay it forward. He wants to be part of the village helping students thrive.
“As those people affected me and poured into me, I wanted to then be able to turn around and be that person.”
The small victories are his favorite part of the job. It’s seeing a student who needed help getting in a stander to support their weight grow until they can chase him around the gym.
The success is shared with families, too. Progress at school is incorporated with parents and siblings finding new ways to play at home. Together, they turn the student’s “I can’t world” into an “I can world.”
“It’s being able to be there for the students and have that positive impact,” he said. “It’s awesome to see that progression of I’m still having to crawl to be mobile to now I’m up and running. I’m so proud of those students seeing (where they came from) and where they’re going.”
“The Honor Role,” an official podcast for Fayette County Public Schools, features employees, rotating through key stakeholders, including teachers, staff, nurses, custodians, cafeteria workers, and bus drivers. Join us as we dive in and learn about their journeys, their inspirations, and their whys.
Episodes are available on all major podcast platforms, including Spotify and Apple Podcasts, and promoted on the social media channels of Fayette County Public Schools.
Episodes will also be available here: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2200811.
