The Golden Apple Foundation Surprises Salazar Elementary Bilingual Center Elementary School Teacher Nita Sengupta with Prestigious Award for Excellence in Teaching
CHICAGO (May 15, 2026) - The Golden Apple Foundation, the leading Illinois-based nonprofit committed to preparing, mentoring, honoring, and retaining great educators who advance educational opportunities for students, today surprised Nita Sengupta, a 6th through 8th-grade teacher at Salazar Elementary Bilingual Center Elementary School in Chicago, with the prestigious Golden Apple Award for Excellence in Teaching. Sengupta is one of 10 teacher award recipients in Illinois.
Following a highly competitive process, the 2026 teaching award recipients were selected from nearly 600 nominations of 4th-8th-grade teachers.
“Great teaching shapes how students learn, grow, and see what’s possible for their future,” said Alan Mather, President of The Golden Apple Foundation. “This year’s recipients are making that impact every day through their commitment to their students and their craft. As they join the Golden Apple Academy of Educators, they will support and mentor aspiring teachers in The Golden Apple Scholars and Accelerators Program in Illinois, helping strengthen future teachers across the state.”
The Golden Apple Awards for Excellence in Teaching honor outstanding teachers for having lasting, positive effects on students’ lives and school communities. Teacher recipients demonstrate, in their teaching and results, a significant, positive impact on their students’ growth and learning.
About Nita Sengupta
Nita Sengupta, a sixth through eighth-grade teacher at Salazar Elementary Bilingual Center, brings mathematics to life through hands-on, real-world application. After teaching concepts such as ratios, proportional reasoning, and statistical analysis, she guides students in applying those skills to meaningful projects that connect directly to their lives and communities.
Sengupta designs annual projects that integrate mathematical analysis with socially relevant issues, combining mathematics with SEL (Social-Emotional Learning) to develop self-awareness, relationships, and responsible decision-making. To ensure students are engaged, she surveys them about their personal interests. Students then get to work in pairs to examine a community issue—such as digital media habits, consumer behavior, or environmental impact—through structured data collection and analysis. They organize data into tables, calculate averages and percentages, create graphs, and interpret results to draw evidence-based conclusions.
This year, Sengupta’s students organized a fundraising initiative to support cleft lip surgeries for children in South America. They applied ratios and proportional reasoning to manage sales, calculate profit margins and fundraising totals, and use statistical tracking to monitor progress. Overall, her students gained leadership and organizational skills while getting the opportunity to witness the tangible impact of their mathematical decisions.
Each award recipient receives a $5,000 cash award and a paid spring sabbatical, with Northwestern University generously providing coursework at no cost. Award recipients also become Fellows of the Golden Apple Academy of Educators, a community of educators who play an important role in preparing the next generation of teachers in the Golden Apple Scholars and Accelerators programs, which are dedicated to addressing the teacher shortage in Illinois.
The nomination period for the 2027 Golden Apple Awards for Excellence in Teaching & Leadership is open. All are invited to nominate exceptional Pre-K-3rd-grade teachers and Pre-K-12th grade school leaders in Illinois at www.goldenapple.org/awards.
Golden Apple’s social media channels will feature surprises for each of the Golden Apple Award for Excellence in Teaching & Leadership recipients. Follow the news here: Facebook | X | Instagram | LinkedIn.
About The Golden Apple Foundation
The Golden Apple Foundation’s mission is to inspire, develop, and support teacher and school leader excellence, especially in schools-of-need. Our leading-edge preparation delivers exceptional teachers who make an impact. We help students thrive in the classroom and in life. Since our beginning, we have recognized master educators annually, and these master educators help prepare the next generation of teachers through both our Golden Apple Scholars (for undergraduates) and Golden Apple Accelerators (for career-changers) programs. Our vision is one in which every classroom has a great teacher, and to realize this, we are committed to making a material difference in resolving the teacher shortage. Visit http://www.goldenapple.org for more information.
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