Class AA Certification, The University of Alabama, 1983. Special Education.
Class A Certification, The University of Alabama, 1979. Education Administration.
M.A, The University of Alabama, 1976. Special Education.
B.S., Troy University, 1974. Special Education/Psychology.
Vickie Gibson Brown of Brent, Alabama, was raised in Marshall County in North Alabama and received her M.A. in Special Education from The University of Alabama in 1976, Class A Certification in Education Administration in 1979, and AA certification in Special Education in 1983.
Mrs. Brown’s career in education spans from her first teaching position at the Education Center at Partlow School in 1974 to her retirement in 2014 from Tuscaloosa City Schools. After teaching at Partlow for three years, she became the principal at Eden School in St. Clair County for two years before relocating to Bibb County where she was employed as a special education teacher and, later, as a special education coordinator for twenty-seven years. In 2007, she accepted a position as director of student services with Tuscaloosa City Schools where she retired in 2014 from a career that spanned forty years.
After her “retirement” from full-time work, she accepted a part-time retiree-position with Special Education Services at the Alabama State Department of Education as an instructional coach for numerous schools, including Greensboro Middle School in Hale County where the first demonstration site for authentic co-teaching was founded under Mrs. Brown’s guidance. This resulted in numerous visitors from other school systems coming to observe high quality instruction and effective strategies to maximize achievement for students with disabilities.
During Vickie Brown’s long and successful career, she has received numerous well-deserved awards and recognitions for outstanding accomplishments in the field of special education. This includes work outside of the school-building and includes volunteer work with the Special Olympics for fifty years where she served as a coach and chaperone. For this, she was awarded both the Coach of the Year Award and Spirit of Special Olympic Award from the Alabama Special Olympics. In 1996, she was selected to be a Community Torch Bearer and was one of sixty who were selected from more than six hundred nominees for the 1996 Atlanta Summer Olympics for her contributions as a teacher and community volunteer. In 1989, she was named Bibb County Citizen of the Year, 2004 Special Education Coordinator of the Year and in 2019 was awarded the Partlow Award by Alabama Civitan’s for her contributions to the field of special education.
During Vickie Brown’s tenure in Tuscaloosa City Schools as director of student services, she was instrumental in helping create the Helping Education/Linking Parents (HELP) Program which created a partnership between the Mayor of Tuscaloosa, Walt Maddox, then Police Chief, Steve Anderson, and the Tuscaloosa Juvenile Probation Court. The purpose was to reduce student out-of-school suspensions, encourage positive behavior, and enhance graduation rates. In 2011, the school system received a Magna Award from the American Association of School Boards to acknowledge the success of the program. Also, Mrs. Brown’s department was instrumental in creating the Harassment Awareness Learning Together (HALT) Program which an anti-bullying program that received the International Hero Award from the Anti-Bullying Summit. Her accomplishments were recognized in 2018 when she was awarded the James E. McLean Excellence in Education Alumni Award from The University of Alabama.
After “retirement” from full-time employment in 2014 and while working part-time for the Alabama State Department, Vickie Brown began to volunteer as director of the Sounds of Joy in the ARC of Tuscaloosa. The ARC serves adults with intellectual disabilities and the Sound of Joy is a choral group made up of ARC members who perform at various venues state wide.
Finally, Mrs. Brown is an interpreter for the deaf and has served the deaf community at Pell City First Baptist, Brent Baptist Church, and currently at Calvary Baptist in Tuscaloosa for a total of 44 years.