Longtime Whitefish paraeducator earns award

Whitefish High School Special Education Paraeducator Velma Luke is the recipient of the Montana Down Syndrome Association Logan Charles Award for the passion, care and creativity she brings to the classroom.

The award honors special education teachers and paraeducators who enrich the lives of children with Down syndrome, according to mtdsa.org, by “... helping our children learn their way, at their pace and in a way that benefits them as individuals, helping them to become self-sufficient, as well as helping them enjoy all social aspects of school.”

She was nominated by Whitefish resident Mamie Flinn and her daughter Abi Kurtz. In the nomination letter on behalf of Flinn’s family, including husband Neil Kurtz, Luke was described as an inspired educator who works to create an academically enriching learning experience based on individual needs.

“She bursts with enthusiasm and it is so clear that her intention is for Abi to learn, feel worthwhile, contribute, and to have a good day while she is at it. From math, to reading, to art, history, creative writing, or theater arts, Velma creates, adapts, co-creates and masterfully assists Abi in becoming not only her best academic self, but also her best young woman self,” Flinn wrote.

Her daughter’s first year of high school was a learning curve for both student and teacher. For Luke, Kurtz was the first student she worked with who had Down syndrome. For Kurtz, it was navigating her freshman year of high school.

“Together they have built a beautifully genuine connection that has fostered Abi’s sense of self and strengthened her ability to fully be. Abi is an artist. She is also, (when armed with a calculator), a mathematician, an actress, a public speaker, a creative writer and a chef. She is a newspaper delivery person, an office helper, and a good friend,” Flinn wrote.

This is Luke’s 20th year as a paraeducator in the Whitefish School District. The past five years have been spent working one-on-one with Kurtz, a partnership that extended to a team of teachers, other paraeducators and her parents. Luke said she coordinated with teachers to adapt curriculum content for Kurtz’s learning style, abilities and interests.

“I would shadow her [in general education classes], and I would take whatever the lesson was the teacher was teaching students, and I would work in a kind of a specialized field of study related to it,” Luke said. “For example, in world history we would study a particular culture of a particular time frame — what they ate, clothing, artwork.”

If researching ancient food — Egyptian honey cakes, for example — they would look up the recipe, create a list of ingredients, go shopping and cook.

“Any food we prepared, we served to her classmates in history class,” Luke said. “Kids would love it when Abi pushed in a cart with food or snacks made in the kitchen related to whatever group we were studying at the time. Teachers would give us time in the classroom and Abi could tell a little bit about it.”

Creative writing was where their understanding of how each other communicated leapt off the page.

“She wrote incredible short stories and poetry in creative writing class. The things she would convey to me, where I may have been running the keyboard and insert little words to make sentences flow, or ask her questions to make a story format, but I knew we were on the right track when her mom read a particular story and it had a phrase her family uses all the time. She knew then, it was truly Abi’s voice in the writing. I think the only reason we got to that point is all the years we had together,” Luke said.

When Luke was first paired with Kurtz, she said she was nervous, uncertain if she had enough knowledge about Down syndrome to support Kurtz’s learning, when Flinn provided her with books that “really helped me to learn how to communicate with Abi and some of the physical challenges Abi has.”

“I wasn’t afraid anymore,” Luke said. “Let’s see what we can do.”

And they did.

Abi graduated from high school last June.

“Velma’s work is a powerful example of how inclusive education can serve all those who are engaged in it,” Whitefish High School Special Services Teacher Christian Bitterauf said. “The creativity of Velma’s work to accommodate student learning to include meaningful and relevant skills for the students she serves is exemplary.”

Reporter Hilary Matheson may be reached at 758-4431 or hmatheson@dailyinterlake.com.