The ballroom at the Sacramento Hilton Arden West buzzed with excitement last Friday evening as teachers and school administrators joined family and friends in celebrating the best of the best of Sacramento’s education community. The event revealing the two Sacramento County Teachers of the Year 2025 was reminiscent of the Oscars, featuring a dinner, heartwarming introductions by students, and enthusiastic speeches given by the teachers themselves. It all led up to the big moment when last year’s champions ceremoniously tore open two envelopes, revealing the winners of the annual competition.
The top Sacramento County teachers for 2024–25 are Joshua Weeks, a 5th-grade STEM teacher at Bell Avenue Elementary School (Robla SD), and Marc Vankeuren, Ph.D., a 10th–12th-grade AP Environmental Science, AP Physics, and Physics of the Universe teacher at Grant Union High School (Twin Rivers USD).
Sacramento County Board of Education President O. Alfred Brown, Sr., presented the two teachers with the top honor the Board bestows: the Elinor Lincoln Hickey Award of Merit. The Sacramento Scottish Rite also continued a long-running tradition of awarding perpetual trophies to the winners. FOX40 News Anchor Richard Sharp was the master of ceremonies at the awards ceremony and also hosted the County Teachers of the Year for a live interview on FOX40 News in the Morning.
The competition and awards ceremony were coordinated by the Sacramento County Office of Education (SCOE). Both teachers are now eligible to advance to the statewide competition where five teachers will be selected as California Teachers of the Year.
What Inspires the Teachers?
As part of the county application process, district Teachers of the Year write a series of six, 750-word essays. SCOE collects some of these insightful and inspirational words and publishes selections in an anthology called Why We Teach. A limited number of keepsake printed copies were available at the awards ceremony. A PDF copy is available for download:
- Why We Teach—excerpts from the application essays submitted by this year’s competitors
Awards Ceremony Playback
The Sacramento Educational Cable Consortium (SECC) is producing a video of the awards ceremony that will air on Comcast channel 15, AT&T U-Verse channel 14, and Consolidated Communications channel 21:
- Saturday, September 14 (4 p.m.)
- Sunday, September 15 (9 a.m.)
The awards program video will also be streamed on the SECC website.
What’s Next?
Throughout the school year, the district Teachers of the Year are honored at events, including ones anticipated to be hosted by the Sacramento Kings, Sacramento River Cats, and Sacramento Republic FC. SchoolsFirst Federal Credit Union sponsors the Teachers of the Year program.
The two winners join an elite group of teachers who have represented Sacramento County over the years. Previous Sacramento County Teachers of the Year are listed online—including Elinor Hickey, the namesake of the award the teachers received. Hickey was County Teacher of the Year 1978. She served for many years as a County Board of Education trustee, and a SCOE community school was named for her.
