Rookies will bring their excitement, as well as their first-day jitters, to school Monday if construction is completed early enough for it to open.
By: Brian Shappell
When the Upper Elementary School and its new wing open Monday, the floors and walls won’t be the only new additions to the building.
Among the crop of new teachers entering the district this year will be fifth-grade Spanish teacher Janine Keil, sixth-grade teacher Namiata Kakkar and sixth-grade teacher Rajini Badachandran.
Though they’ve taken different routes to get here, all are set to bring their excitement, as well as their first-day jitters, to the school Monday as long as construction on the building is completed early enough for it to open.
Though the earliest any of the teachers will be able to get into the building will be late-afternoon Friday, making setting up their classrooms prior to student arrival nearly impossible, these three rookies see it as a chance for a quality bonding experience.
"They will get to create their own classroom and make it their own," Ms. Kakkar said about her students. "We’ll be making decisions together."
Though Ms. Keil will be experiencing life as a teacher for the first time, she will be in familiar surroundings as she is returning to the building she graduated from high school in, in 1997.
"I feel like I’m entering just like a fifth-grade student because I’ve never taught before," Ms. Keil said. "So I’ll experience all the excitement and anxiety with them."
While the trio of new teachers said they are excited and ready for the opening of school, they all know the importance and difficulty of teaching pre-teenage students.
"It’s a big task because it’s a time of change and growth both emotionally and intellectually," Dr. Badachandran said. "Here, you are getting them prepared to be adults. It’s an enormous task because, even if you’re a mother of two, you now have to become the intellectual mother of 28."
Ms. Kakkar has been focused on the first day of teaching for her entire life, she said. In fact, Ms. Kakkar can still fondly remember the days when, instead of watching cartoons or playing with dolls, she was playing school.
I had school in the basement," recalled Ms. Kakkar. "I was always the teacher and had my little attendance books."
Ms. Kakkar, who was born in India, moved to a Boston suburb when just 3 months old. As Dr. Badachandran joked, "She’s a true Pilgrim." Ms. Kakkar studied in both a high school teaching program at West Windsor-Plainsboro High School and a five-year master’s degree teaching program at Rutgers University, where she graduated from in May.
"I’ve always wanted to teach," Ms. Kakkar said. "I had the most amazing high school teachers. And working in the classrooms during high school and student teaching in college was just phenomenal."
Ms. Kakkar’s colleagues took a bit of a different route both Dr. Badachandran and Ms. Keil enrolled in the state’s alternate route program, which allows graduates and professionals without teaching degrees to become educators in their area of expertise.
Dr. Badachandran may have taken the longest "alternate route" of any of the new teachers in the area. Dr. Badachandran, a former Rutgers University political science professor and a professional artist with an expertise in oil painting, decided well into her career that she wanted something more meaningful in her life.
"I felt what I was doing was not enough," she said. "All great artists at one point have wanted to see the child in themselves. I felt like I’m now able to integrate my backgrounds in the arts and social science through teaching."
Dr. Badachandran graduated more than 25 years ago from the University of Madras in India with degrees in the history of fine arts and painting and from New York University with a Ph.D. in political science.
She said she is excited to have an opportunity to share her widespread cultural and intellectual background with the soon-to-be young adults.
"I’m looking forward to diversity in my classroom," Dr. Badachandran said. "Judging by the names of the students, it’s a very multicultured classroom. I’m very excited about that."
Ms. Keil also was a May Rutgers University graduate, studying Spanish and English while at school on the banks of the old Raritan River. However, she found her way to teaching in South Brunswick in an unlikely place Spain.
"I studied abroad in Spain and fell in love with the language," Ms. Keil said. "I realized the importance of immersing yourself in a language. I love Spanish so the best thing I could is share it with young people."
One thing Ms. Keil, Ms. Kakkar and Dr. Badachandran all will have to learn quickly is how to relate and get the best out of their young students.
"It’s such a different mind set, because you have to learn how to think like a fifth- or sixth-grader," Ms. Keil said. "You have to learn how be able to describe things like a handshake, whether it’s firm or gentle."

