Denise S.

Denise Spence has been an educator for over 24 years. She has earned her Master's degree in Curriculum and Instruction, emphasis in Instructional Technology. Over the years, Denise has taught the correlated course content and earned the following IT certification credentials: CompTIA A+, CompTIA Network+, Adobe Certified Associate in Dreamweaver and Microsoft Office Specialist in Word/PowerPoint/Excel/Outlook. Her accomplishments include being selected as 1 of 3 finalists for Lee County's Teacher of the Year in 2000; she was the 1st ever Career and Technical Education Teacher of the Year for Lee County in 2006; she was named Certiport' s Global Summit's Teacher of the Year for 2010 and later selected for the inaugural Certiport Certified Ambassador program. Plus, Denise was a 2011 and a 2012 finalist for the Microsoft Innovation Forum. For her leadership in providing college and career related information technology training, Denise was asked to be a Faculty Champion for the Microsoft Imagine Cup and was selected to be an Adobe Education Leader. For her impact on the business community, Denise was selected as a finalist for the Fort Myers Greater Chamber of Commerce - Women in Business - Apex Award in 2011. Recently, she was nominated in the Education category, for The Greater Fort Myers Chamber of Commerce Celebration of Business & Tourism Chrysalis Awards 2015 & 2016 and Denise was selected as the winner of the Inaugural Southwest Florida Regional Technology Partnership Women in Technology Award for 2015. Presently, Denise is the lead technology teacher at Dunbar High School, where she serves as the business technology department head and is the programs manager for award winning technology programs: the Academy for Technology Excellence (a Microsoft Showcase School), the Academy for Digital Excellence (an Adobe featured school program) and the Academy for Game Design and Programming Excellence. Under her supervision, these programs have been featured both locally and internationally for how they prepare students for both college and careers. She has developed a long term relationship with the business community by maintaining a Business Advisory Committee at Dunbar High School. Plus, Denise has trained and certified students, teachers and administrators in a variety of Information Technology industry areas. Denise is also, an adjunct professor at Florida Gulf Coast University, and served as an adjunct professor for Hodges University. Concurrently, Denise has presented at several state and national conferences, including repeat appearances at the Florida Educational Technology Conference, Magnet Schools of America National Conference, and a presenter for Adobe and Microsoft at various Career and Technical Education conferences around the United States. She has even done several national and international webinars related to career and technical training in high schools. Denise collaborated with The National Career and Technical Education Foundation (NCTEF) and Microsoft Corporation’s U.S. Partners in Learning to help develop the IT Career Cluster guide for the States ”College and Career Readiness Program” series. Denise was a featured author for the Microsoft PowerPoint 2013 training video series for LearnKey. Denise collaborated with the local YMCA to develop and host “Tech Quest, a technology enrichment summer camp. Plus, she is the founding sponsor for an all-girls computer club called GO-4-IT (Girls Opting for Information Technology), which tackles the diversity issue in the computer science fields and the founding sponsor for the first SHPE Jr (Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers) club in Lee County at Dunbar High School. Denise has earned a couple of Golden Apple Teacher of Distinction Awards for Lee County Public Schools.