Truly Making A Difference

Lauryn Munson, Staff Writer

If you have never met Mrs. Kloeckner or any of the students in our special education program, it is time you do so. Mrs. Kloeckner is one of our amazing special education teachers, who also has five kids of her own and still manages to make life for the special education students beneficial and fun.

Mrs. Kloeckner has been teaching special education since 1978, and she began as a student teacher for these students and fell in love with it. She absolutely adores children and working to help people has always been a passion of hers. She believes that everyone has a right to education and when the law was passed in 1975 saying that public schools must have a special education program, she was elated.uryn photo

Mrs. Kloeckner does many amazing things for our high school. For example, we have a program called “Circle of Friends” that Mrs. Kloecker helped start up. She got the idea from a parent. “There is a program similar to this one at Aspen Creek,” said Mrs. Kloeckner, “and the mother told me how big of an impact it had made on her daughter, and so I thought, ‘why not?’ we should give it a try.” Any student can join the program; by doing so you spend one of your lunch periods a week eating with your chosen special education student. You get to talk with them, play games, read books, and become the best of friends. It is also recommended that you contact your friend once, whether it is by email or phone, during the week. Students in the program enjoy the relationship opportunity.

Mrs. Kloeckner and her fellow teachers also organize many fun activities for Circle of Friend members. They have a chance to go bowling, go out to breakfast, go watch the school play together, and exchange presents in the holiday season. The program has become very successful over the years. It is such a blast and great experience, I recommend it to everyone.

On top of all of this organizing and helping the students outside of their education, Mrs. Kloeckner also teaches a math, a reading, a homework study session, and a work experience class. In work experience class the students get to make greeting cards and sell them. The special education students have been selling homemade greeting cards for $1-$2 since 2006 to help raise some money for the program. If anyone wants to to stop by and grab a card in room 857, you will be able see how hard these kids work to produce these awesome cards.

Mrs. Kloeckner loves everything about her job, well, except for the paper work. She says one of the coolest things she has done so far this year is have the students go to homecoming. “We believe that if each of the student’s friends’ dance with them for five minutes, it is going to make such a big difference and the students are going to have a great night”, Mrs. Kloeckner said.

Thanks to Mrs. Kloeckner and her fellow teachers, the special education students in our community are better taken care of than anywhere else in the district. Look to get involved with the students especially through Circle of Friends , it will make a huge difference in both your life and theirs .