Joe T. McNab: The story of a hermit crab

Lisha Hylton is a third grade teacher at Pelion Elementary School in Lexington School District #1. She and her husband along with their three children, Haley, Tripp and Tyler, reside in Lexington, South Carolina. Lisha's love of nature and marine ecology evolve from her early years, when she and her parents (George and Claudia Lander) resided on The Isle of Palms, a barrier island off the coast of Charleston, South Carolina. Lisha's commitment to teaching science, integrated with social studies, reading, writing and math is evident in the hands-on motivational teaching strategies she uses when teaching state standards involving nature, ecology, environmental science and conservation. Her dedication to inspiring students' involvement and stimulating young minds has earned Lisha the title of teacher of the year in 2002. In addition, she has recently been nominated for the South Carolina Conservation Teacher of the Year through the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources. Acting as service learning coordinator at her school for five years, Lisha also accepted The South Carolina State Superintendent Service Learning Award for Pelion Elementary School. She served on her district's integration team, where teachers and administrators devised a website for teachers; creating a link for teachers, integrating all subjects and state standards.

She is currently working with a University of South Carolina team, known as THE RISING TIDE; including university professors, nationally acclaimed science researchers and PHD candidates as they pursue the environmental science area of Paleotempestology (a science that involves the study of past storm events). Lisha's role on this team, as the teacher component, is to participate in field studies and lab investigations. Then she creates lesson plans on the team's studies to be utilized in classrooms.