Students returning as teachers 

Students who become teachers often return to the same school, and that means that things have changed since they were last there. There are two teachers in particular,CBA teacher Vanessa Ragnarsson and AP Gov teacher Daphne Ghersi, who attended Deerfield Beach High School. They spoke about how they felt about coming back to a familiar place, what made them want to become teachers, and most importantly, what made them want to teach at a school they attended. They mentioned what has changed since they were students, and how the two teachers differ.

CBA teacher Vanessa Ragnarsson graduated from Deerfield Beach High School in 2015 and has been teaching for 6 years. When asked why she decided to teach at the school she graduated from, she said, “I graduated from Deerfield Beach High School in 2015, and the CBA program was a huge part of my experience here. I learned a lot of the skills that eventually turned into my career, so when I had the opportunity to come back and teach in the same program, it felt like a full-circle moment. I wanted to give students some of the same opportunities I had, but also build the program into something even bigger.”

When asked how it felt to return to a familiar place, Ms. Ragnarsson said it felt “definitely surreal at first.” She explained, “I went from walking these halls as a student to having my own classroom and being the teacher. Now I teach alongside the same teachers I had, so that was a little weird at first. But at the same time, being somewhere I already had a connection to made it feel comfortable. It was also such a surreal feeling when I walked into the CBA hallway and saw all the paintings and artwork that I helped with when I was a student.”

AP Gov teacher and former Deerfield Beach High School student Daphne Ghersi says, “I always saw myself coming back to teach at Deerfield because I had such a good experience, and I was very involved, and living in Deerfield, I just wanted to be in my community.” Ms Ghersi also adds the fact that she felt welcomed when she first started teaching because she had her former teachers there to help her. “I was a little nervous at first because it was straight out of college, but coming back to the school I graduated from, I felt pretty comfortable because I knew I could rely on my former teachers to help me.”

While Ms. Ragnarsson’s reasons for coming back to Deerfield Beach High were more career-based, she says that CBA had a big part in her high school life, so she wanted to give that experience to other students. On the other hand, Ms. Ghersi’s reasons are more general; she always knew she’d teach here, and it also came down to the school being close to her.

Written by Jordan Moore  | Graphic Designed by Jordan Moore 

Published September 14, 2026 | ePathfinder | Features