Cheryl Tuttle
My name is Cheryl Tuttle. I grew up in Hoopa, attending Hoopa Elementary and Hoopa High School before receiving my B.A. from Humboldt State University. I am a member of the Yurok tribe and I also have Karuk ancestry. At HSU, I was a member of the Indian Teacher Education and Personnel Program. I received my Multiple-Subjects Credential from Dominican College, out of San Rafael, but based in Ukiah. I later received my Administrative Credential from Sonoma State. I am currently in my first year of a master’s program from Wilkes University in coordination with the National Institute for Professional Practice, working towards a Masters in The Art and Science of Teaching.
This is my ninth year teaching at Round Valley Unified School District. Prior to teaching in Covelo, I taught for ten years at St. Mary of the Angels School in Ukiah, three years at Potter Valley Elementary School in their Primary Core program, and three years at the Woodlands Charter School in Ukiah.
When I started at Round Valley Elementary I developed the Community Day School and taught as a CDS teacher for three years. I loved the students I worked with and enjoyed this new challenge. Then I spent three years as the Principal at Round Valley Elementary School. I enjoyed and was challenged by this work also. I am proud of our accomplishments, as a staff, during this time period; particularly moving the elementary school out of State Sanctions (SAIT) by increasing our Academic Performance Index (API) by 74 points in three years. While I felt a lot of satisfaction in this leadership position, I missed being a teacher so I resigned as principal to hopefully be able to teach again.
I spent the next year as a Teacher on Special assignment, writing grants, writing our technology plan and managing RVUSD’s Library Grant, which allowed us to renovate and revive our elementary school library. During this time I wrote for and received a grant from the Indian Land Tenure Foundation. I spent last year helping the district begin to implement the Indian Land Tenure Curriculum in the Elementary and High School. I also taught a high school Yearbook class and high school Multi-Media class. A lot of amazing talent and products came from these two classes! We also made a lot of progress in our implementation of the Indian Land Tenure Curriculum. I was able to model the lessons in grades 2-5 and enjoyed every moment!
This year, while I am still working on implementing the Indian Land Tenure Curriculum at the elementary school, which included teaching a High School Multi-Media class for one semester and model lessons again in grades K-5, I am also a part-time Curriculum Coach for the elementary school. In this position, I am helping teachers in grades K-8 with their benchmark assessments and helping to support implementation of the Effective Direct Instruction (EDI) and New Management in-service training our staff received.
On a personal note, I have been married to my husband Frank for thirty-one years. My son, Koiya (28) is attending the University of Arizona in Tucson for a Masters in Microbiology. My daughter, Ruby(26), lives in Eugene with her husband and my two beautiful grandchildren. Ruby is receiving her BA this year from Sonoma State University in Liberal Studies, while her husband is working on his doctorate in Linguistics, from the University of Oregon. To top it all off, my husband is in his third year of a doctoral program for Clinical Psychology from Pacific Graduate Institute and will begin his internship next year. Needless to say, we value education in our family!
