“Some days, it’s just managing chaos,” said Barb Baughman, a 22-year veteran of the Mahomet-Seymour School system.
And on this particular day at Middletown Prairie Elementary, she had to find a last-minute substitute teacher, she had 15 students tardy because of the time change, and she had four students needing to go home sick all at once.
By 11 a.m., she had expertly managed the chaos. Tardy students were checked in and went to class. A substitute was found. Kids went home to recuperate.
Baughman has worked in the office at Middletown Prairie for 19 years. She was the comforting face nervous parents saw when they handed in registration information at Kindergarten Round Up. She was the calm voice on the other end of the phone call telling parents their child was sick or hurt, and needed to come home. She gave our three, four and five year olds a friendly smile and a band aid if they needed one.
On Thursday, March 19, she will walk out of Middletown Prairie’s office for the last time as a full time employee. The following day, she is flying out to Seattle to see her granddaughters.
“I’m not wasting any time,” she joked.
What she wants to remember
Baughman said she has met many wonderful staff members and parents over the years.
“I’ve gotten to know a lot of parents either through PTO or them volunteering in the school,” she said. Those parents often came back as younger siblings attended Kindergarten too.
Another thing she said she will remember is how the children grow over the course of their Kindergarten year.
“The kids come in so shy,” she said. “They won’t tell me their name or look at me. It’s amazing how much growth they make, both academically and socially, in a year. They are more assertive at the end of the year.”
Baughman said thinking back on one Kindergarten project makes her laugh still.
“We used to do a restaurant series,” she recalled. “It was a lot of work for the teachers, but the kids would prepare food, serve it, and clean up afterward. There were a lot of funny things that happened with that I wouldn’t want published,” she joked.
What she won’t miss
The most stressful day in her MS career, she noted, was the day a bomb threat was called in to the school district.
“We were in an administrative meeting when it came in,” she recalled.
Stressful elements included wondering if the threat was real. The threat was discovered on a “late start” day, so children were not in the buildings, but busses were running already, and had to be rerouted to local churches. Staff had to be evacuated from buildings.
“Parents were calling wondering what was going on.”
Baughman said staff and administration learned a lot from that May, 2010 incident. She said a crisis team was implemented and she feels MS is more prepared to handle such a situation should it ever occur again.
“That was a scary day, but we learned a lot. I hope we never have to test the plan again.”
Other elements Baughman won’t miss revolve around the old Middletown building. “I always hated being the last one in the building and having to lock up in the basement: All those rooms down there.” She also admits she didn’t like having to put the boiler on standby because of the loud noise it made.
How have things changed during her tenure?
“My workload has increased,” she said. “When I started at the Junior High, we didn’t have state reporting. Now we have state reports due continually.”
She also said classes are larger now than they were 22 years ago. “There used to be 16-18 kids in a class. Now there are 18-20 in each of the classes.”
And full-day Kindergarten and a brand new building were huge changes, according to Baughman.
Plans for retirement
Baughman said one plan is to not have to be dressed before 8 a.m., and to not have to drink her second cup of coffee while commuting from her home in Monticello. She also hopes to travel, both with her husband Dave, a farm manager, and to see family. Granddaughters Maya, age 3 ½ and Molly, age 2, take a particular priority in her travel schedule. In addition to her husband and granddaughters, Baughman said she has three grown sons. She also wants to be around their families.
“I also will travel to Ohio to see my family,” she said. Baughman’s parents, cousins and other relatives still live near Columbus, where she grew up. She said she is looking forward to visiting them.
Advice for your successor?
Baughman’s advice for the next person is simple: “enjoy the children and enjoy the job.”
“Very few days are the same, so you won’t get bored,” she noted. “Some days there is a lot of chaos and managing that chaos is all that gets done. But at the end of the day, the children made it home safely, and that’s all that matters. You’ll always have tomorrow to get things done.”
