Her Story
About Louisa
I've been working in education and coaching for several years now. I coach girls' ski racing and have been coaching skiing for about 6 years total - 2 years specifically as a ski racing coach and 4 years before that as a regular ski instructor. I'm also a substitute teacher, which I've been doing since November, so about 6 months. As a sub, I work around the district, K-12, any age group or class - I'll think I'm doing art, and they'll be like, alright, during your prep period, you're gonna go teach calculus. In my coaching role, I'm responsible for their safety on snow, teaching them proper technique, but also teaching them self-regulation skills in terms of meditation and visualization, and overall body control, whether that's physical or mental. I have my bachelor's degree in urban planning and sustainable development, which I got in June of 2024, and I'm also an EMT with my emergency medical technician certification. The skiing and rafting work is a lot of seasonal, so substitute teaching works out really well to supplement that intermittent period. I'm currently working on going back to school while I work, hoping to either go to get my doctorate in physical therapy or actually go to med school. One of my most notable achievements was when I was in college - my research partner and I were able to stop the construction of a metal shredder because we presented data to the city showing that the area already had adverse health risks and was at the maximum, so building the shredder would have been horrible for the environment and the people in the area.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Louisa
01What do you attribute your success to?
I think my environment, playing a team sport in college really helped me to always feel held securely. I've also had really good coaches in my life, and consistency with training has been important to me.
02What’s the best career advice you’ve ever received?
I think the best advice I've ever received career-wise is do something that you enjoy, because no amount of money is going to offset you know, feeling unfulfilled internally.
03What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
Don't take it too seriously, I suppose. I think children can be a little brutal at times when they say a lot of things that they don't mean. So just, you know, don't take it personally. If a kid is having a bad day, it's not about you.
04What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
I think in teaching, and part of the reason I don't think I'm going to go into it, is what I see as a substitute teacher - I have a lot more kind of leeway on what I can do. I feel like I constantly watch teachers at the schools, and they don't have a lot of wiggle room, and they're kind of constantly under pressure from whether that be administration or parents. I think the biggest challenge is just that teachers aren't allowed to do, I feel like, what is best for the students sometimes if it doesn't align with the overall bureaucratic structure of the institution.
05What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
I think patience, kindness, and openness to understand are most important to me. I've watched people, especially in education and coaching, get burnt out. You have to be able to communicate something to someone in a way that they can understand that, especially kids. People don't always learn from just sitting and listening. Some people are tactile, some people need to be vocal about what they've learned. So, making any environment, whether it's on the ski hill or in the classroom, an environment that allows everybody to understand and enjoy the topics at hand is really important to me.
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