February 23, 2000
One worker many jobs
By Cathy Willoughby
Staff Writer
Hers is the first friendly voice greeting parents of Krout Elementary children in the morning. And she offers help and solace for a skinned knee or lost lunch money.
The school secretary wears many hats during the school day. One nurse nearing the end of her tenure is Mary Ellen Zahn. Her last day is Tuesday, and she has been serving the students, parents and staff of the Krout Elementary school for the past nine years.
This is just one of her stints in the Tiffin City School district, where Zahn has been employed for 30 years. She began as a classroom aide at Clinton Elementary and was there for 15 years.
"When I was an aide at Clinton, I split my time evenly,'' she said. "When I was out there I was not strictly classroom, I also had lunchroom and playground duty. I would always have to be the ogre, to keep the peace. When I came here (Krout) I was in the classroom, but I also did lunchroom and playground (duty) occasionally. Then it was almost a perk, because you could deal with the kids on a different basis.''
She came to Krout to help with the many split classrooms they encountered.
"While I was an aide there, I loved it,'' she recalled. "But as a non-certified employee, you go where the need arises.''
That led her to a position as an aide in the developmentally handicapped classroom, what now is known as the resource room. Then the position of school secretary became open.
"That was nine years ago; I replaced Laura Kiesel,'' Zahn said. "We had her for over 30 years as our secretary, She started with the building; I had some big shoes to fill. She had always done the job and had done it very well.''
Zahn was apprehensive about applying for the job and discussed it with her friends on staff, receiving encouragement from them.
"I didn't really think that I was qualified,'' she said. "But I was also getting older; lunchroom and playground duties were seeming more difficult. And I thought it might be nice to wear a white hat instead of a black hat.''
She hasn't regretted her decision once over those years. "No two days are alike,'' Zahn said.
Her day begins on the telephone. "We get phone calls constantly,'' Zahn said.
Most callers are parents notifying the school of a child's absence due to illness. "We have to report to the state on a daily basis the attendance of each child,'' Zahn said. "By the time the lunch count is in, around 9 a.m., if we have not heard about a child, we have to call the parent to find out why the child is not here.''
Winter cold and flu season means more attendance to track. "Right now, the phones are ringing off the walls,'' she added.
After the barrage of telephone calls, Zahn gets down to her real job.
"My primary responsibility is keeping the children's permanent records,'' she said. "I keep track of them in their individual folders, either entering or withdrawing students.''
A big change that took place while she has been there is to Education Management Information System state reporting.
"That is accountability, accountability, accountability,'' Zahn said. "The information that we feed to the state &emdash; what they get from us in terms of attendance figures &emdash; decides our school district's funding. It's called the 'child count' and must be in by the first week in October.''
She said that Jean Angus, Tiffin City School district's EMIS coordinator, stresses the importance of accuracy to all district secretaries.
"She says that it has to be in there and accurate,'' Zahn added. "Because attendance is what decides our funding. If we've missed a student, it would cost the district $3,000."
If the numbers are off considerably, district superintendents could lose their licenses. "We don't feel any pressure,'' she said, laughing.
Other special services that each child receives and other programs, such as open enrollment, must be recorded by the school secretary.
"Now we have a new reporting,'' Zahn said. "We have to keep track of all of the preschool experiences for kindergarten students. They want to use the data to check back and see what influence it has on proficiency testing.''
Security concerns at all school buildings also affect the school secretary's job.
"We have to be well-versed in all of the safety precautions, such as fire drills, tornado drills and now, lock downs,'' Zahn said. "There is a special code for that; and we have to keep an eye out in case someone should enter the building of a suspicious nature.''
A list in kept in the office to allow visitors to sign in and they receive a special, colored badge to wear, identifying them as a "safe'' person.
"There is also an evacuation plan,'' she said. "This is something that was not thought of in the past, but I am glad that we have it. It should be reassuring for parents.''
Soothing minor hurts and drying tears are other duties that Zahn said she will miss.
"At lunch time, we are taking care of the needs of the teachers, and all injuries are sent to the office,'' Zahn said. "We always keep a box of ice and ice bags in the office handy. It saves steps. A bag of ice can heal a lot of wounds, and takes care of a lot of complaints.''
Children with injuries of any severity, especially a head injury of any type, will need to contact Mom or Dad.
"Especially with head injuries, we err on the side of being overly cautious,'' Zahn said. "If we are questioning it, we let them come in and make the call.''
Flu season also keeps here busy.
"During a time like this , it's nothing to take 25 temps in a day's time,'' she added. "We try to keep them occupied and see what their temperature is before we send them home.''
All medications must be dispensed through the main school office.
"I am the one who records all of the dispensing of the medications,'' she said. "I have to document it for each child, as to the time of day and what is given to each child.''
State law has changed with regard to inhalers. They had been kept at the school office, but now the child can keep them. "All inhalers were kept under lock and key,'' Zahn said. "Some of the parents have said that they still would like to keep it that way.''
Most of the "conflict resolution'' tasks fall to Principal Judy Vanderbeck, Zahn said
"She has them try to talk it out; sometimes she will have one or two next door and I will have a couple over here as a time out away from each other.''
Yet the biggest change she has seen in the past nine years is in technology.
"We are computerized,'' Zahn said. "We were before, but nothing like we are now. For all of the buildings, education technology is the biggest change.''
She hopes to transfer her computer savvy to home use after she retires.
"I hope to get a computer at home and be able to do e-mails at home to our grandchildren,'' she said.
She will miss the children, their cute expressions and stories from home.
"The kids tell you things sometimes that you want to just die laughing,'' she said with a chuckle. "They say some very funny things, you want to laugh, but you have to wait for them to turn their backs.''
"Sometimes I will get with some of the people we worked with and tell stories. And we just get hysterical,'' she added.
"And we have family situations that you wish weren't that way,'' she said. "But you try to deal with them as positively as you can. We hope that the classroom serves as a safe harbor; we are lucky here and at Clinton, that we didn't have a lot of that.''
With five grandchildren &emdash; three in the Atlanta area and two in Toledo &emdash; she and her husband have been long-distance grandparents.
"My husband, Tom, just retired also. Just right now we want to just enjoy the time together and to travel and see the kids as much as we can,'' she said.
"In the summers, we can spend more time at the lake,'' Zahn added. "And if I want to read, I can read all day, do needle work. Whatever.''