Kelly Wild 1994-95

Kelly Wild 2014

• She attended Chalmette only her senior year after a law­suit forced St. Bernard Parish to integrate the sexes in its schools.
• Kelly's first eleven years of schooling had been all-girls through Andrew Jackson High School.

She attended LSU on a full scholarship in those pre-TOPS days.

• She quickly realized she had made a poor choice of a major.
  
  I absolutely hated engineering. It was the bane of my exist­ence. When I came home that summer, I told mom I was not going to be an engineer but a teacher. She cried. "I don't think you know what you're doing. You'll never make any money. People won't respect you." But I didn't change my mind.
  
  
• She switched from LSU to UNO, but many of her engineer­ing credits didn't transfer. So she took 4 1/2 years to grad­uate.
  
  I had no intention of ever teaching in a Catholic school. My first choice was St. Bernard Parish, but I went for an inter­view and there were no openings in the middle or high schools for a math teacher.
  
  
• She submitted applications to the Archdiocese and indi­vidual schools.
  
  I got two calls - Dominican and Brother Martin. I didn't want to teach in an all-boys school because I went to girls schools. I interviewed at Dominican first, but they hadn't called back.
  
  
• Sister Lawrence, the Brother Martin math chair, met with her. Needing a geometry teacher and learning that Kelly had practice taught Geometry at Andrew Jackson, she offered a job. Since she hadn't heard from Dominican, Kelly accepted. Dominican called a day late.
• Three days later, she was teaching Geometry in summer school at Brother Martin.

• After three years in that role, she took over Student Council when Claire LeBlanc became Director of Student Activities.
• She kept that position until she became Math Department Chair in 2003.
• Her favorite subject was Advanced Math, which she taught every year.

Along came Katrina.

• Kelly had water in the attic of her house in Chalmette.
• She evacuated to her brother's house in Ba­ton Rouge.
  
  When it all set in after a few days, I called Cath­olic High to speak to Brother Barry. I found out that Gene Tullier was there. I went over there and worked during the transition time to set up the night school.
  
  
• She lived at her brother's house the rest of the semester along with two other siblings.
  
  My sister was in school at LSU. It was cramped and not ideal, but it was not by any means the worst. Many people were much worse off than I was.
  
  
• How does she remember that semester in Ba­ton Rouge?
  
  When I look back at it, it was fun. But I didn't think that at the time. There was so much stress from dealing with flood insurance people. People were on edge all the time because of so much outside stuff. But we never had to wake the kids up. At night, we were tired, but the kids were at their best.
  
  
• The second semester of the 2005-6 school year provided new challenges.
  
  We had so many kids back who had been all over the place. Kids sitting next to each other in class who had totally different first semesters and learned different things. You couldn't be mad at the kid.
  

Kelly continued as Math chair until 2010 when she assumed the position of Director of Student Forma­tion, which she'll be handing over to Ryan Gallagher for 2014-15.

I've enjoyed this job although it comes with a lot of things you don't know it comes with. You're dealing with two different ends of the spectrum: Advanced Placement, honors, and special needs.

I went through all the training last summer. The kids did well in it. Everyone made an A or B. They get credit in College Algebra for the first semester and College Trig for the second. They can transfer the credits to any school. For many students, depending on what they major in, that takes care of their math require­ment.

With Laurie Leftwich retiring, Kelly will assume the position of College Counselor for 2014-15.

I'm very much looking forward to my new job. I went to a conference with Laurie a couple of years ago and started picking her brain. It's something I'm interested in. I'll still teach the dual enrollment Precalculus.
I've talked to seniors about their college selection pro­cess. The biggest regret they have, through no fault of Laurie, is not starting earlier. That's kids' M.O. I want to get them thinking about college at the sophomore level. Then look for schools as juniors. Senior year is the act of applying.

As usually happens, Kelly was caught off guard when informed she was the 2014 Brother More Schaefer Award winner.

• When she arrived at school during December exam week, principal Greg Rando asked if she had a minute. On her way to give a test, she said she could meet afterwards.
  
  He had already told me about my new job. So I thought it had something to do with that. I ask­ed if anything was wrong. "No, don't rush," he said.
  
  
• When she walked into Greg's office after the exam, he called President John Devlin.
  
  That's the tipoff. It's either really, really bad or it's good. Since he had already told me nothing is wrong, I kind of knew. John was the one who actually told me.
  It was very humbling. How many other people should have gotten it? I didn't know how to re­act except to just be overwhelmed.
  
  
• She found the leadup to the big day stressful.
  
  Speaking in public is not my favorite thing. It's not the same as teaching. In the classroom, you know exactly what it is you're talking about. But what am I going to talk about in my acceptance speech? I couldn't wait for it to be over. That's a shame. It's such a nice day, but I just wanted the speech to be over.