By Stefani Leeper
Just one text is all it takes to make or break a future, and God has a humorous way of using these phone mishaps in the best of ways.
Michelle Velbis knows this all too well. The date: May 2015. Velbis stared at the screen of her phone, pads of her thumbs typing a short and sweet thank-you note to her friend Diane. She scrolled through her list of contacts, found the name, and sent off her message. She received no response until the next day.
“Great to hear from you, Michelle,” read the text from Diane Harris, the associate superintendent of education for the Rocky Mountain Conference (RMC).
Knitting her brow, Velbis skimmed the thread of their conversation only to realize she sent her thank-you text to the wrong Diane.
However, she does not label this mistake completely under the category of human error. “That ‘accidental’ text started an avalanche of providential occurrences,” she said.
And only God’s intimate knowledge of her history can account for that.
As a teen, Velbis turned down a diving scholarship to Wright State University to honor the Sabbath. She pursued an education degree before switching to English. Post-graduation, the Ohio native became a journalist and a gymnastics business owner, serving 800 students. However, it was only after dramatic life events that she was able to fully discover Christ’s boundless love.
After her divorce, she sold her business and began sending applications to various Adventist schools, not receiving any bites until Spring Creek Adventist School in Montrose, Colorado, gave her a call. Her resume reached the head of the board, and as the teachers of the small one- room school were on vacation, she was offered the position. Velbis later learned she would not have received an offer if the proper evaluation team had been there to weed out applications. But in this case, God provided for her, and she could not refuse the call—even though it seemed illogical to move herself and four children for a small-town teaching position.
“I love to look back and see where God was leading and preparing me for teaching,” Velbis passionately said.
Recognizing God’s call, she became a teacher and taught in Montrose for two years.
She later met her husband and moved with him to Florida. Two years after her move, the small school where she taught closed. One year after that, her accidental text reached the phone of Diane Harris.
Now, Velbis serves as the teacher and the principal of Daystar Christian School in Pueblo, Colorado. Managing grades 1 – 8 in one classroom is not an easy task, but she makes it work through individualization.
Velbis posts a daily blog to which she uploads lesson plans and homework assignments. The children are to study the materials before coming to class, where they receive further instruction. If they are struggling to understand concepts, she will work with them one-on-one. She has found this method works well for mathematics and English, and for broader topics such as history, science, and Bible studies, she teaches them collectively, and provide them with individualized homework. She shared that lesson planning is difficult, but it betters their education as it is tailored to each student, something extremely important to her.
“I did not have the privilege of growing up in a Christian home or having a Christian education, and because of this my journey has been more difficult than some, but I also appreciate the journey all the more now.”
She also utilizes 21st-century project-based education. During the last school quarter, her students spent two days brainstorming ideas for helping the city of Pueblo, and decided to use two key foci: health education, and aiding the homeless of the Pueblo Rescue Mission. Their program, Healthy Helping Hands, involved the city, and doubled as a real-life skills-builder for the kids, who called and emailed people, found and arranged the location to hold the event, and eventually raised $400—among other donations—for the homeless. They also recruited the Rocky Mountain Conference Health Ministries Director Rick Mautz as their health speaker. Their work received recognition in the June 2016 issue of OUTLOOK, The Pueblo Chieftain, and the Rocky Mountain Conference’s NewsNuggets.
Her appreciation of education extends beyond the traditional system. Like Ellen White (Education) and Mexico’s renowned 17th century female scholar and poet Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz (La Respuesta a Sor Filotea), she believes a curriculum of subjects, taken with a desire to understand the whole—spiritual, mental, and physical—is what helps a per- son recognize the omnipotence of God. Only by acknowledging Him and learning how to find Him in all things can educational voids be filled.
That philosophy is reflected in every class, and in every tie Daystar has with the local community, whether it be through giving back to the homeless and less fortunate or forging community ties with the local Chamber of Commerce, business owners, colleges, and the public library, serving as “a reflection of our commission by Jesus Christ as given in Matthew 28.”
Her approach to education is unique, but pre- pares her students for life outside the classroom. By having the students complete some schooling online and holding them accountable for their assignments, they are being prepared for high school and college, which use a similar structure. Additionally, they are learning the lessons of thinking on their own, being responsible and self-sufficient. “I feel like their cheerleader,” she explained, elaborating on how she acts as a support system to students growing up in one of Colorado’s most dangerous cities. “Remembering my own childhood, and the impact that some of my teachers and mentors had in my life, motivates me to ‘pass it on.’”
“I want my life to be a testimony of His love,” she summarized, before quoting Zephaniah 3:17, her favorite Bible verse: “For the Lord your God is living among you. He is a mighty Savior. He will take delight in you with gladness. With His love, He will calm your fears. He will rejoice over you with joyful songs” (NLT).
–Stefani Leeper was the 2016 summer communication intern for the Rocky Mountain Conference, and is starting her senior year at Union College.