RALEIGH - Cindi Rigsbee has a message for her students posted in the front of her classroom: "I believe in you."

"And they know I do," she wrote in a national teachers' magazine this year.

Rigsbee found that plenty of people believe in her, too, when she was named the state's next Teacher of the Year.

In receiving the AT&T-sponsored award Tuesday night at Raleigh's Brier Creek Country Club, she said, "I decided if this would happen ... I decided I would accept this honor with quiet dignity and grace, but yee-haw!"

Rigsbee joined the staff at Gravelly Hill Middle School in the Orange County Schools district when the school opened in the fall of 2006. She teaches reading to sixth- and seventh-graders.

In her more than 20 years of teaching, she has taught middle school language arts, reading, dance and drama at schools in Durham, Guilford, Vance and Wake counties. She was named Durham Public Schools Teacher of the Year in 1996-97 and Regional Teacher of the Year in 1998. In this round, she was named the Piedmont-Triad Central Region Teacher of the Year.

Rigsbee also has shared the lessons she has learned from her own teaching experiences with other teachers. She served as Teacher on Loan to the N.C. Department of Public Instruction from 1998 to 2000. She has spoken at many conferences and served on committees affiliated with state and national education associations.

In February, she published an article, "Positively Teaching," in Teacher Magazine.

"The difference between the way I dealt with the struggle as an inexperienced teacher and the way I dealt with it yesterday is considerable. To me, it's all about relationships," Rigsbee wrote.

"Now, in the middle of all the stress of high-stakes testing and all the instructional demands placed upon us, I can feel my blood pressure lowering when I see my students coming down the hall to me. Those goofy middle school kids are my family during the day, and they know we're in it together. Our class motto is 'Whatever It Takes.' We'll do whatever it takes to be successful, together, like a family."

Rigsbee will spend the next school year traveling the state as an ambassador for the teaching profession. She'll also serve as adviser to the State Board of Education.

Her prizes include a personal automobile from the N.C. Automobile Dealers Association, an engraved plaque, a cash award of $7,500, a national conference trip, the opportunity to travel abroad through an endowment at the N.C. Center for International Understanding and a technology package valued at more than $14,000 from the SmarterKids Foundation. She also will be North Carolina's nominee for the National Teacher of the Year competition.