NEW LEXINGTON — “Hola, mi nombre es Beverly.”
Beverly Watson’s room is designed to give the impression of being on vacation in Mexico. The posters catch the attention of many in her class as they are decorated with plenty of colors and Spanish quotes.
Watson, 55, is the Spanish teacher for New Lexington High School. She’s the boss in the classroom, but at home her three cats rule over her life. Watson’s cats are named Max, 6, Syd, 4, and Milo, 2. She plans on traveling with her cats anywhere she can in the world.
Watson was a military police officer for six years; she started at 18 and resigned at age 23. After she was done serving, she started teaching. She has been teaching for 27 years of her life. She became a teacher because of her love for children and the desire to teach them different languages. She teaches Spanish because she happens to be the best with Spanish, even though she also knows German and French, and also because it’s one of the most used languages in the United States.
Watson has three kids; Conner is the oldest out of all of them, Alexis is the beloved middle child, and Lindsay Kate is her youngest. She smiled as she was speaking about her children. Watson was 29 when she had her first child. She has been married for 28 years to Scott. Her childhood was filled with good memories of events with her family on vacations. At age 13, Watson went on vacation with her family to Florida where she saw the Atlantic Ocean for the first time and immediately fell in love.
“I love the ocean because of all the different colors of blue,” Watson said.
She described her time in the Air Force as “it was sometimes fun, sometimes very sad, and sometimes very hard.”
The work she did was interesting to her in many ways. She loves to learn new things. She was always busy but she found ways to joke around with her friends while serving in the Air Force. They would often sit down together watching a movie or a TV show just enjoying having each other around.
She was stationed in New Mexico in the desert. Watson, with her legs crossed, peered to the other side of the room in deep thought of her home there.
“Not only was the desert a clean place, it was also very hard to live in. You kinda had to live the way the desert made you live,” Watson said.
“She is a very bright person and loves kids,” said Sean Bartholic, a math teacher at New Lexington High School who has worked with Watson for five years.
Zane Hubble, a sophomore in her class, said, “I enjoy her class not only because I am learning Spanish but because she is a great teacher.”
She slowly looks around the classroom as she starts talking about her cats. She said all her cats were stray cats before she took them in. All three are domestic shorthairs. She wears a big smile on her face as she is talking about her cats as if they were like children to her in a way.
Watson’s perfect day for her is to wake up, feed her cats and give them a lot of attention while being outside with a cup of tea. To be exact, the tea she would have is black tea and unsweet. She reads a book while taking in the sun.
She also enjoys surfing.
“It’s one of the funnest things I have ever done,” she said.
In addition to teaching, Watson also works at Olive Garden; sometimes on Wednesdays and Thursdays but mainly on the weekends.
She looks around smiling, thinking about her perfect day.
Gracie Givens is a student journalist with Tri-County Career Center and High School and New Lexington Workforce Development Center’s New Media+ program.
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