Being able to teach her students how to figure out the puzzle of doing math was God’s gift to Jill Hall.
Finishing her career in education as Southside Elementary School’s math coach was a chance for Hall to help students who struggled in the subject she has loved since childhood.
“… I just light up when I can sit down and help somebody,” says Hall, who still gets phone calls from former students asking, “Hey, how do I do this?” So even in retirement, she loves helping when they’re stuck – telling them, “We’ll figure it out together.”
Growing up, Hall remembers not wanting to sit down to read, but she always enjoyed solving math problems.
Hall, who began her career at Mortonsville Elementary School in 1989, says she did not want to retire or leave her Southside family because she loved what she was doing.
In addition to having grandchildren, Hall didn’t want to do a second year of a new training program for math teachers, so younger teachers would have that opportunity. “So for me,” she says, “it was time … to walk away only because somebody new needed to take on all that leadership.”
Because in addition to helping struggling students in small groups and individually, a math coach trains other teachers on strategies for teaching math.
Hall, who left Woodford County for a few years after getting married, returned to teach in the GATE (gifted and talented) program at Simmons Elementary School before teaching math at Woodford County Middle School. At Southside, she was a fifth and second grade teacher before finishing her career as a math coach/specialist, “which I absolutely loved,” she says.
While reflecting on more than three decades of teaching, Hall takes pride in having four daughters who chose career paths helping young people. Like her mom, Allie Clements teaches. Oldest daughter Sarah Learning is a physician in pediatrics, Bekah Jones is doing her residency in pediatric dentistry at the University of Kentucky, and Kamryn Hall works at a daycare and is a substitute teacher in Woodford County schools.
“It’s kind of ironic that we all are kid-friendly (in what we do),” says Jill Hall, whose husband Kevin is a special education teacher.
Growing up in Woodford County, Allie, Sarah, Bekah and Kamryn were “lifeguards … and babysitters … so I guess that is just part of who we are.” It was a part of who she was too.
So, when Hall was deciding what to study in college, she chose teaching because “I love kids.” For her, teaching took root at Jane’s School of Dance and in Bible School – and her passion for teaching math has never waned.
“I feel like math is one big puzzle. You give me a problem, and I’ve got to figure it out,” says Hall, who earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in elementary education at Transylvania University and the University of Kentucky.
Hall has never stopped learning or learning how to solve a math problem differently. So, she says, “It’s just fun to be able to help kids understand things (when solving math problems), and understand why they are what they are.”
This is the final story in a series of stories profiling the 2025-26 Teachers of the Year in Woodford County Public Schools.