Maryvale 4th grade teacher wins ‘Pay Tribute to a Teacher’ award for May

The KTAR News 92.3 FM’s Outspoken with Bruce & Gaydos “Pay Tribute to a Teacher” award for May went to David Solano, a fourth grade teacher at Palm Lane Elementary School in Maryvale.

The award sponsored by Your Valley Toyota Dealers gives a deserving teacher $2,500 each month.

Solano is in his 27th year teaching. He said he entered the profession after being denied entry to public school himself due to a disability.

“When I started to get older, my mom said, ‘You need to become a teacher, David’ and she’s like, ‘You have to change the way people were treated at one time, the way you were treated at one time,’” he said.

Solano said it seems like teaching chose him in a way, with him providing representation for his students.

“I’m a Hispanic man and all through my school life I only had like four teachers that looked or sounded like me, and I can’t tell a kid to do better if I’m not trying to teach them how to be better and try to be in the front of the room and try to give them an example that, hey, we can lead the classroom,” he said.

‘Pay Tribute’ winner unites kids through basketball program

In addition to teaching, Solano runs a nonprofit basketball club after school at a local gym. This year, his team won a district championship.

“We just ended our ninth season doing this. And we average 85 kids a night. And [that’s] 85 kids in Maryville, when kids don’t get along, from different schools. In our gym, they’re a community. We don’t we don’t create a basketball team, we create a basketball community,” he said.

Solano said he plans to use some of the prize money to help fund the basketball program over the summer, as well as using some funding to take his kids to Disneyland.

Want to nominate somebody for the Pay Tribute to a Teacher award? Submissions are accepted here.

Funding for this journalism is made possible by the Arizona Local News Foundation.

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