Despite excruciating nerve pain in his back that forced him to miss the entire first semester of his senior year, Ponderosa High School student Jordan Meyer will graduate on time - and he credits his guidance counselor for that feat.
"Ms. Kershaw arranged my homework, worried about my tests and not a day went by when she didn't call or e-mail me to find out how I was doing," Meyer said of the time it took for his broken back to heal and for doctors to discover the source of his ongoing pain.
Meyer, 18, was just one of the Parker area students to recently honor over 40 educators who most affected their lives at two dinners held at area churches on April 8 and 16.
Ponderosa and Chaparral High School seniors from the local congregations of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints were given the opportunity to choose an educator, write a tribute to that teacher and join them for a dinner celebrating the effect they've had on young lives.
Mike Loitz, Ponderosa High School administrative dean who spoke at the dinner for Ponderosa students, compared the evening to a baseball game.
"I'm a Cubs fan and every year Cubs fans say 'this is going to be the year.' The Cubs have been saying it for 100 years. At the start of school, students say 'this is the year.' This is the year I'm going to make the team, or this is the year I'm going to get straight A's."
He said in the case of high school, the students are the "pitchers," and the teachers - the hitters in the game - want to connect and help them learn. "The students throw curve ball, after curve ball, after curve ball. And then we hit one. We've connected. Every teacher has had that moment. That's why they're here. For all the teachers in here, this is the year."
Town of Parker Mayor David Casiano also spoke at the dinner. "I wish you could be honored like this every day. You deserve it," he told the teachers present.
Award dinners such as this have been going strong in the Denver area for over 11 years and were started by the man who is now the stake president for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the Parker area, Brent Hillier. He believed young adults needed to reach out and recognize those teachers who had impacted their lives in a significant way, and so a tradition was born.
Tributes, such as the one written this year by Logan Keicher, 18, to his teacher and coach Bret Crock, were heartfelt and moving. "I have always admired Mr. Crock because he is, in essence, everything that I can only hope to become. A genius who not only has the capability to write calculus textbooks, but actually does, a financial wiz, lungs that never run out of air and legs that never tire, undying passion for his students whom he wants only the best for, and a great sense of humor. Mr. Crock is a shining symbol of everything that is good and what I want to become."
Each teacher was given a certificate and an engraved plaque to commemorate the evening.