A member of the Blackshear City Council was recently declared Brantley County Middle School’s teacher of the year.
Council member Corey Lesseig, who represents Blackshear’s second district, works as an educator in nearby Brantley County. There he teaches eighth grade Georgia studies and social studies, an appropriate subject for a man with a PhD in history.
Earning his Bachelor of Science and then his masters degree from Truman State in Missouri, it was Lesseig’s love of history that brought him to Ole Miss, the University of Mississippi.
“If you love Southern history, Ole Miss is the place to be,” Lesseig says.
Lesseig certainly counts himself as a Southern historian, citing C. Vann Woodward as a strong influence.
“He legitimized being a southerner writing about southerners.”
What Lesseig loves most about his chosen subject are the stories. “I like the stories. You have to know where you have been to know where you are,” says Lesseig.
Asked about his approach to teaching the subject to his own students, Lesseig says that as a professional historian, one is supposed to make the tangled web of history a little less complicated, more understandable. He also strives to get students to make a personal connection with history, saying that if kids can see how something from history affects them, they gain a greater understanding of it.
Lesseig’s favorite period of history is early twentieth century.
“It is such an interesting period,” he says. “Everything became electrified, literally, and became localized.”
Lesseig’s dissertation was on auto mobility and how the new technology changed things. The question, he says, is “do we shape technology or does technology shape us?”
With questions such as those in mind, Lesseig approves of recent initiatives at the school where he works. He feels the recent cell phone ban is a step in the right direction. He also likes that on certain days they use no digital technology at all, going completely old school.
One of Lesseig’s favorite classroom activities is naming the 50 states and their 50 capitals.
“No one in the room can totally dominate the game,” says Lesseig. “Everyone can jump in somewhere.”
Being Brantley Middle’s teacher of the year has Lesseig feeling much the same as when he earned the title at Pierce Middle County School in 2017.
“I am honored and humbled,” says Lesseig. “Teaching is an honorable profession. I am humbled, because we never do it entirely right. There is no perfect person, no perfect people.”
The former Marine doesn’t find teaching history in Brantley and working in local government in Pierce all that different.
“I think they are very similar in some ways,” Lesseig says. “As you get into local politics, that’s how people relate their problems to you— with their stories, history. All politics are local and all history is personal.”
Up for re-election this year, Lesseig is near the end of his second term, having served the city of Blackshear for nearly eight years. Though Missouri born, he regards Blackshear as his home and with Lisa, his wife of nearly 37 years, raised his family here. His three daughters, Camille, Mandy and Carolyn, all graduated from Pierce County High School.
Recognized by his peers at Brantley Middle as teacher of the year, Lesseig is now in the running for teacher of the year of the entire Brantley school district, but only time will tell who receives that recognition.
Unlike Pierce County, where that decision has already been made, Brantley County will not announce their own district winner until later in the 20252026 school year.
