Erika L. Robinson and Clinton F. Beckner, III 1854 North Herndon Street Arlington, Virginia 22201 703-243-6406
To Whom It May Concern:
We
write to convey our whole-hearted recommendation of Jeffrey Riley. We met Jeffrey when our older son, Jacob
Beckner, had the good fortune to be assigned to his kindergarten class
at Arlington Science Focus School in the fall of 2004. When we learned that this would be Jeffrey's first year at
ASFS, as well as his first year working with kindergarteners, we were
slightly nervous about entrusting him with the job of shaping our son's
first impressions of elementary school.
Our concerns, however, were allayed upon meeting him and eliminated
altogether just a few days later after the school year got started. It did not take long for us to realize
that our son had been blessed with the gift of a natural teacher. Over the course of the kindergarten year,
Jeffrey repeatedly demonstrated tremendous energy, creativity, patience
and consummate professionalism as he introduced his nineteen students
to the academic world.
Jeffrey's
dedication to his students and their families appears unmatched. It would be impossible to overstate,
for example, how much we, as two working parents, appreciated the classroom
website and blog and Jeffrey's regular email communications. Jeffrey made it so easy for us to stay
connected with what was going on in the classroom and encouraged us
to communicate with him freely outside of classroom hours without making
us feel we were the intrusion on his personal life (which we must have
been). Furthermore, his ability to distill complicated
concepts into distinct components and then to explain each component
separately until a five-year-old can understand how it fits into the
entire concept has been invaluable.
In our experience, it is rare to find someone, like Jeffrey,
who is able to simplify difficult concepts into such manageable pieces.
In
addition to his obvious passion for teaching and his intelligence, Jeffrey's
dignity, respect for others, sense of humor and good-natured presence
serve him beautifully in commanding the attention of a room full of
very high-energy students without quashing that energy.
Jeffrey
taught our son so many things, not the least of which were how to read,
how to take pride in putting in the effort needed to produce quality
work product and how to aspire to being consistently safe, kind and
fair. He taught us a number of things that have
helped us to be more effective as parents to Jacob. In short, besides being a gifted teacher,
Jeffrey is a wonderful person whom we both greatly admire. His thoughtfulness, humor and general
good nature gave our son and us a wonderful kindergarten year.
We
believe that any school, and, more importantly, its students would benefit
greatly from having Mr. Riley as a teacher. Furthermore, we strongly believe that any child would be extremely
fortunate to have him as a parent.
Please
do not hesitate to contact either of us should you have any questions.
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