Brandon Frederick
Congratulations to Brandon Frederick, the World Affairs Council’s 2014-15 World Educator!Each year, the Council honors a local K-12 teacher who demonstrates leadership in connecting students to the world and contributes to the development of new programs and resources that enable other teachers to do the same.
Brandon is a social studies teacher at Bonney Lake High School in Sumner, WA. He has been teaching social studies for over 15 years and currently teaches AP Human Geography, AP US History, and AP Government and Politics. Brandon demonstrates a deep investment in educating students about world affairs and promoting cultural understanding in and out of the classroom. He established a series of “field studies” with his sophomore students in order to extend the classroom to the local community and make global connections with local experiences. Brandon also implemented an annual event at his high school called the International Economic Summit through training he received at the Idaho Council on Economic Education and the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco. This Summit involves about 200 high school seniors each year, divided into country teams, and competing in a giant trade simulation. Students dress up, cook food, negotiate alliances and trade pacts, and discuss global issue statements. Brandon now oversees this Summit at two high schools. In addition, Brandon succeeded in bringing Advanced Placement (AP) Geography classes to Bonney Lake High School and attends AP Readings in June to score AP exams. He has also served as the Social Studies department chair, is on the literacy committee, and is seen as a leader by staff and students alike.
One of his students describes Brandon as follows:
[Mr. Frederick] has a passion for teaching and you can tell because he does not just teach in school but he offers for students to meet him after school…to teach them real life in person examples and he makes them fun and exciting…he gives up his personal time to help students learn and it is sometimes as simple as staying after school to help kids study or help kids understand topics better. He cares about students not only in his class but all the students in the school to the point of him personally bringing AP Human Geography to the school and without him I would have never learned about cultures in other countries and how they started…I cannot even explain what he has done for me as a student and as a person because he has completely changed me and my views of the world.
Not only has Brandon brought the world to the classroom, he has also traveled with students and teachers to Turkey, China, Korea, Thailand, South Africa, Greece, France, Australia, and Italy. Brandon is also working to establish a sister city in China and a sister school in Turkey. Finally, Brandon has been actively involved in the World Affairs Council‘s Global Classroom program for a number of years. Besides regularly attending our programs, he has served as a teacher liaison and was one of the teachers selected to travel to Turkey as a representative of the World Affairs Council in 2013. Brandon also participated in the World Affairs Council’s 2014-15 Fellows program. We are proud to recognize Brandon as our 17th World Educator recipient!