Boone County Board of Education honored two of their employees at the monthly meeting April 13, 2023.
Michael Johnson, head custodian at IGNITE Institute, won the Kentucky Education Association Education Support Professional of the Year award in 2022. That put him in the running for this year’s National Education Association’s annual award. Of the 38 nominees, Johnson is proud that he and Kentucky came in second.
“We recently traveled to Seattle, Washington for the NEA ESP Conference…We are proud to have had one of our own be in the running,” said Johnson’s nominator Boone County Education Association President Charlie Bufano.
“I am a walking Skittle’s bag of abuse. My dad was a monster. I never had a role model to look up to,” Johnson said. “So, when I came on staff at Burlington and saw kids with the same look in their eyes that I had as a kid, I knew my purpose—to provide them with a hand to lift them up, an ear to hear their problems, or just a smile to let them know they are in a safe place… no matter what your job is here, you are an educator.”
Johnson is very active in helping other children in such circumstances and has long been a part of organizations such as Knights of Columbus, Special Olympics, Toys for Tots, and Connecting Hearts.
A Boone County School employee is singled out each month for special recognition as the Break the Mold recipient. The April honoree is a counselor at Steeplechase Elementary School.
Terri Hall stepped up at the last minute to prevent four children from being abandoned at Christmastime. On Dec. 20 last year, social workers came to the school to remove three students Hall knew from her work with them at Steeplechase. There was a fourth child in that family she didn’t know existed then.
Hall asked what would happen to the children. She was told that there were no foster homes available and the staff would simply take turns staying with the kids in an office at the agency, at least during the Christmas holidays. The only other option available would be to eventually split them up among three homes.
“They needed somewhere to go,” was Hall’s simple answer as to why she would take on four more children. After a quick consultation with her own three children, she took all four into her home, doubling her family size.
So, her abruptly blended family now includes children aged 4, 6, 8, 9, 10, 12 and 16. This helped not only make a happy holiday time for the children, but has extended well into 2023.
Hall’s school community quickly rounded up Christmas gifts and other needed items. They added food supplies to the $6 per day per child food allowance from the state.
She recently discovered that none of the kids had ever had a birthday party, so it was a new experience when they celebrated birthday milestones.
Because Hall was not an official foster parent, she immediately began taking the training and welcoming the home visits and is now almost finished with the process. While she makes no predictions about the long-range future, she welcomes the addition to her family for as long as needed.
