Duo works together toward career goal
Friends have been inseparable on road to becoming teachers
By Jimmie Covington
Contact
June 13, 2006
At ages when many people have settled into their working lives, Southaven residents Rita Meek and Charlotte Wade are on the brink of new careers as elementary school teachers.
Meek, 49, and Wade, 35, friends who have become "sisters" over the past 10 years, are excited and enthusiastic about their futures in the classroom.
Meek has three children ranging from 19 to 33 and two grandchildren, ages 10 and 5. Wade has twin boys who are 14.
Over the past four years, the two friends have had little time to catch their breaths. They have:
Taken care of their homes and families.
Worked full-time during the daytime as teacher assistants at Greenbrook Elementary School in Southaven during three of the years.
Attended college full-time in the evenings and during the summers at Northwest Mississippi Community College and the University of Mississippi at DeSoto Center in Southaven.
They recently received their bachelor's degrees in elementary education from Ole Miss.
The two met in 1996 when Wade's twin sons entered kindergarten. Meek was the teacher's assistant in the class and called the youngsters the "look-alike boys" since at the time she could not tell them apart.
Through the years, Wade and Meek have become almost inseparable. They often finish each other's sentences when they're talking.
"We are family," Wade said.
Wade later became a teacher's assistant at Greenbrook. When they decided to return to college in 2002 to obtain their teaching degrees, they would finish their workdays at Greenbrook and then ride together to DeSoto Center, where they took nearly all of their classes together.
Because of the daytime requirements of their senior year education block at Ole Miss this past year, they had to give up their teacher assistant jobs.
During the early part of the year, both were assigned to Batesville Intermediate School for training. They rode together to Batesville. Later, both were assigned to Shadow Oaks Elementary School in Horn Lake for practice teaching.
Talking about their university experiences, Meek said, "We were together so much in all of our classes that one of our professors, Dr. Carolyn Adams, never got us separated.
"Our name became 'Charita' (a combination of Charlotte and Rita). She would just call on 'Charita.' We would both look up, and she would point to one of us."
Meek has worked 19 years as a teacher assistant in various locations. In the late 1990s, she took three years off to work in the office of her husband, Jeff Meek.
Wade became a PTA mom at Greenbrook when her twins entered the school, and in 1998, became a teacher's assistant there, which allowed her to be near her children. Meek had left her assistant's job but returned in 2000.
A couple of years later, both decided they wanted to go back to college.
"I just decided one day, 'OK, why shouldn't I get paid (as a teacher) for what I do,'" Meek said.
After high school, Wade had spent a year and a half at NWCC in Southaven but had not made a decision on what she wanted to study. Meek had a semester of college.
Wade's husband is Mark Wade. Their twins have attended Southaven Middle School and will attend Southaven High.
Wade, who says she wants to teach sixth grade, would like to get a job at Southaven Middle, but doesn't know whether that will be possible.
Meek said she prefers teaching first, second or third grade. However, both are prepared to teach in whatever positions they are offered.
"I feel like with the experience we have had as assistants and now the four years of hard work we have had here (in college), we are ready to teach," Meek said. "I feel we are highly qualified to teach these children, and we are so excited about having our classrooms."
-- Jimmie Covington: (662) 996-1406
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