Two education veterans recently joined Idaho Education Association’s team as region directors in eastern Idaho and southwest Idaho to help local education associations in those regions to better advocate for their members.
Caitlin Pankau, a 10-year veteran educator who taught English in high schools and middle schools in
Caitlin Pankau
East Idaho, stepped into her new role as IEA’s Region 5 director earlier this month.
Stephanie Myers, a career-long educator and education advocate currently serving as president of the Boise Education Association, transitions to her new role as a region director in IEA’s Western Organizing Center in July, after her service with the BEA ends.
IEA’s nine region directors help local education associations and their educator members collectively secure better pay, benefits and employment conditions. They build relationships and lend expertise that produce better employment outcomes for IEA members. When needed, they also help local education associations advocate on behalf of individual members.
“IEA members would be hard pressed to find better advocates than Caitlin and Stephanie,” said IEA Executive Director Paul Stark. “Their understanding of the challenges educators face, their knowledge of how school district administrators approach their work and their passion for public education make them outstanding professionals for these roles.”
Stephanie Myers
Since first becoming an educator in 2012, Pankau taught English to high school students in the Pocatello/Chubbuck and Soda Spring school districts. She first became involved with the IEA in 2016 as building representative in her school and Region 5’s representative on IEA’s Human and Civil Rights Committee. In 2018, she became a facilitator for the National Education Association’s Leaders for Just Schools initiative. She teaches as an adjunct faculty member at Idaho State University and volunteers for literacy and human rights programs at the College of Southern Idaho and the City of Pocatello. Pankau earned her bachelor’s degree in English teaching at Boise State University and her master’s degree in curriculum and instruction for adolescent literacy through Concordia University Online.
Myers taught special education at East Junior High in the Boise School District for 17 years before being elected to serve as Boise Education Association president in 2013. She served on the Idaho Department of Education’s Professional Standards Commission and served on Gov. Brad Little’s COVID-19 Task Force. She earned her bachelor’s degrees in elementary education and special education at Boise State and her master’s degree in curriculum and instruction at Northwest Nazarene University.