On Oct. 1, Huntsville City Schools announced that Montview Elementary STEM coach Heather Hall had been named national runner-up for the 2026 Toyota Family Teacher of the Year Award. In an interview that day, Hall told WAFF she hopes to invite students and families into Montview’s STEM lab and perhaps create outdoor activities with grandparents. The idea is a possibility she wants to pursue; neither report lists dates or says those events are scheduled. HCS also said Hall was in her 21st year in education.
There is already a room where that idea could begin. In August 2025, Montview reported that a Toyota Driving Possibilities grant had brought boxes of supplies for a new STEM lab. The school credited Hall, then its new STEM coach, with organizing the materials and preparing the space. Montview described a dedicated room for hands-on learning, where students could explore, experiment and discover. The award announcement now puts family participation alongside that existing work, while leaving the details open.
Hall’s work at Montview follows several years of building technology programs across Huntsville City Schools. In a June profile, the district said she had spent 20 years in HCS and served multiple elementary schools as an Innovative Technology Coach. She helped develop STEM labs from the ground up, with hands-on work in robotics, coding, 3D printing and engineering. HCS said the effort focused especially on schools with the greatest need, bringing those learning opportunities to children across more than one campus. A district STEM coordinator told HCS that the lessons were designed to keep students engaged while building skills they will need for future STEM work.
That districtwide experience also brought Hall a separate Alabama honor. Huntsville City Schools named her the state winner of the 2026 Chiquita Marbury Innovative Technology Award in the Instructional Technology Coach category, an award sponsored by the Alabama State Department of Education. The district said colleagues and leaders nominated her for collaboration, leadership and building future-focused learning environments. In June, HCS said Hall would continue this work as Montview’s full-time STEM Coach, a role made possible through the Driving Possibilities Toyota grant.
Montview’s STEM room and Hall’s coaching role came through Toyota’s Driving Possibilities grant, separate from the Family Teacher award. The district’s Oct. 1 announcement identified Hall as runner-up and showed the $5,000 check; WAFF reported she already had ideas for the money. Her family-and-student activities remain hopes for what might come next, not a scheduled program.
HCS said Hall was in her 21st year in education on Oct. 1; its June profile counted 20 years of service in the district. That earlier report described several years of work across elementary schools, a path that preceded Hall’s full-time role at Montview.
Hall is expected to be recognized at a conference in San Antonio in November, WAFF reported. For Montview, the more local possibility is to let relatives take part in the kind of hands-on learning Hall has helped build. Her idea of inviting grandparents outdoors came from her own description of what she hopes the award can support. The public accounts do not yet say which projects families might try, who can attend or when an invitation would go out.
For now, the confirmed milestones are the school’s STEM lab, Hall’s record of developing learning opportunities across HCS and her national runner-up award. A new family program is not yet on the calendar. If Hall’s idea moves forward, it would begin with a classroom resource already in place and a teacher who has spent years making technology and experimentation part of students’ everyday learning.
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