By CRISTINA JANNEY
Hays Post
Sondra Hickert is a "school mom."
She loves her students like her own. She celebrates their joys and sympathized over their defeats. She has cut the cake at weddings, cried at funerals.
Hickert, 57, has been a teacher at what is now the Learning Center, Hays' alternative school, since 2000.
She was nominated by Amy Albrecht for September's Hays Post Teacher of the Month.
"She is warm, caring, compassioante and encouraging lady. She does so much to help the Learning Center students, and in turn, these students love going to school.
"She tells the students how proud of them she is. If a student is having a rough day, she offers them a listening ear and has helped many a student through anxiety attacks or just bad days. She becomes a 'school mom' for these students. She is a very special lady, and the Learning Center is so lucky to have her."
Hickert said her students come from varied backgrounds often with stories of tragedy and trauma. Some have lost parents or siblings. Others have suffered through major illnesses, including cancer.
"The wonderful thing about the institution is that it's a level playing field," she said.
Breath in your lungs
Having attended several funerals of students who died by suicide, the first thing Hickert does is sits her students down and explains, "The only student I can't help is the one who dosen't have breath in their lungs."
Hickert who worked in social services for the government after graduating from Fort Hays State Univeristy, said she constantly uses those skills she developled working for the government to help students access resources to meet basic needs.
Sometimes students' loads are too heavy for them, Hickert said. They need to have a place where they can lighten those loads.
Hickert often uses a quote from an author, "These students do not care what you know, until they know that you care."
"If I don't care about the relationship with these students, why should they care about the education I have to offer them?" she said. "Sometimes that goes very quickly and sometimes it's a daily, daily process."
Being present despite struggles
Hickert has her own struggles. She contracted a viralent hospital-based strep infection while visiting her father in the ICU in 2012. It attacked and severely damaged her lungs. Her lung capacity was and continues to be significantly affected.
In 2019, she contracted a severe bacterial meningitis infection in her spine bed during a routine back surgery. She was in the hospital for 48 days.
"I have to show up every day, overcome my own obstacles, be present and thank them for being kind to themselves," she said.
She doesn't share her whole story with her students, but understanding she also struggles, she said helps her students feel they can overcome their struggles.
"I think it can encourage them for one more day ... one more day ... one more day," she said.
A time to celebrate
When Learning Center students graduate, it's a time for a celebration. The Learning Center conducts graduation ceremonies three to four times a year, so the students can receive their diplomas in close proximity to the time they complete their degrees.
Hickert writes personal bios that are read for each graduate. She not only highlights the challenges that brought them to the Learning Center but their plans post-graduation.
"Our graduations are only 30 minutes, but sometimes there's laughter, sometimes there's tears and always a lot of hugs," she said.
Among her tales of heartache, she has incredible stories of triumph, including a young women who became a licensed practical nurse at 19 and a first-generation American earning her degree.
"No less fabulous is the kid who couldn't pass a thing, and we ground through and ground through. They're are a full-time employee with with benefits, who will run across Dillons or run across a bank lobby or run across Walmart to say, 'Hi, Mrs. Hickert!' " she said.
"It's always about them. One of things we talk about when we talk about the breath in their lungs is 'It is not about what I want for you. It is about what you want for you. My sole job is to take what you want for you and find that path to make it possible.' "
A calling that almost wasn't
Hickert almost didn't become a teacher. She studied history and polictical science at FHSU. She had dreams of going to law school.
When she told her FHSU mentor she had signed a contract with the Department of Health and Human Services, she was over the moon, but her professor said, "I've never have been more disappointed." He had hoped she would teach.
She started substitute teaching in the Hays school district in 1993 after her children were born. Both she and her husband were traveling for work, and they decided one of them needed to be home for the children.
When she finally took the job at the Learning Center, she drove to Manhattan where her mentor and his wife were now living. Hicket wanted to tell her former professor she was going to finally be a full-time teacher.
His wife told her the professor had dimentia, but "He may not know now, but he will know on the other side of heaven."