St. Mary’s School honored two if its long term teachers during the school’s graduation program on Friday. Jamie Hartrich, the school principal, was recognized for 20 years of service and Donna Zvonar who teaches eighth grade, was recognized for 45 years of service.
In 2002 Hartrich saw an advertisement in the St. Mary’s Church Bulletin and took a leap of faith.
“My brother saw it and said, ‘Don’t you teach this?'” Hartrich said. “And I am like, ‘Yes I do teach technology’. So, I started here teaching technology and then grabbed math as math is my true love and then became principal.”
Hartrich’s first day at St. Mary’s wasn’t a typical first day at work.
“I had found five children,” Hartrich said. “They weren’t any of our students. They had found a way to jimmy the door and got in and destroyed the building. So all it took was one email out to our staff and they had their husbands and their children and we just started cleaning.”
According to Hartrich the highlights are “being around these kids all day and getting like 150 hugs in a matter of no time.”
Zvonar taught everything when she started. They had no planning time. They did their own P.E. , their own art. She taught science, language arts and religion. She now teaches sixth, seventh and eighth grade science as well as confirmation.
One thing Zvonar will not do is say the ‘B’ word. She simply refuses to do it.
“I say insects,” Zvonar said. “I think kids need to learn how to make a collection. And I think that insects are fascinating because there are so many kinds and colors and they’re plentiful and they’re important to our world. And so it’s a good way to do that. And so I have learned over the years lots and lots and lots of things about insects.”
According to Zvonar the hard times at school have been times when enrollment was down and at one point the school faced being closed.
“We were told that we had to have 88 kids for the next year or they were going to shut us down,” Zvonar said. “I don’t remember the exact number (we enrolled) but it was more than 88 because God provides. So that was a rough time.”
Highlights for Zvonar include graduations, confirmations and being able to have her own granddaughter in her class. Another was when one of her former students was named science teacher of the year.
Parents interested in enrolling their children in St. Mary’s can call the school and ask for Director of Development Kim Prochnow and ask for a tour. Or they can go to the school’s website stmarys.net and use a tab to ask for a tour.
