Roane State Community College

Deborah Miles

June 7, 2017

By Bob Fowler
Roane State staff writer

CROSSVILLE, Tenn. – Deborah Miles says she was born to teach.

“I never really wanted to do anything else,” said Miles, whose favorite childhood game was playing school and making math worksheets for her younger siblings.

She’s an associate professor of mathematics at the college’s Cumberland County campus and has been at Roane State for 27 years. That’s about 82 semesters, counting summers. She’s taught more than 5,000 students.

Still, her passion for education continues unabated. “What makes me love teaching is knowing that what I do makes a difference in people’s lives. The feedback I receive is very rewarding,” she said.

“Students thank me every day. I feel like I’ve taught math to everybody in the county. Wherever I am, people wave and say, ‘Hi, Mrs. Miles!’”

She said her math classes usually have about 20 students, and those smaller classes are a “huge benefit.”

Many high school graduates aren’t prepared for university work and the independence of life away from home, she said. Roane State gives them a “stepping stone” to a successful collegiate career. “We provide an invaluable service to those students,” she said.

Her courses range from math learning support, which helps those students who lack adequate basic math skills, to statistics and calculus.

Miles teaches five classes each semester. Statistics is the course that’s most in demand to fulfill general education requirements, she said.

That class teaches students to “question the numbers they are bombarded with on a daily basis,” she said. “I try to get students to think critically about everything they read and hear.”

In her efforts to educate, Miles says she keeps explaining concepts in different ways until her students have that “eureka!” moment and they suddenly understand.

Miles obtained her bachelor’s degree in math education from Louisiana State University in Shreveport and her master’s degree in math from University of Tennessee in July of 1990. She started teaching at Roane State that August.

She and her husband, Kirk Miles, a Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency biologist, have three daughters – Emily, Mallory, and Haley. They all took classes at Roane State before transferring to universities to complete their bachelor’s degrees.

“Roane State has been an integral part of my life,” says Miles, “I’m very blessed to have a job I love so much.”​

To learn more about academic programs at the Cumberland County campus, call (931) 456-9880.