After 28 years in the education system, Jeanne Cunningham is retiring from Rushmore Avenue School. Starting out as an aide for a year, Cunningham worked at Cherry Lane School for 17 years and has been at Rushmore for the last 10 years.
One of her favorite elements over the past decade was the notoriety.
“You feel like a movie star when you go out. The kids on the playground will call out, ‘Hello, Ms. Cunningham!,” she recalls. “So, you know, you do feel like a movie star sometimes. It’s cute.”
Cunningham says she went into teaching because one of her biggest role models was a teacher.
“I had a 5th grade teacher, Mr. Dibble, and he was great and I liked the way he ran the classroom,” she says. “I thought ‘I could do this as well. I could do a good job.’ I thought I wanted to try and do as good a job as he did and that really set the mood for me. I just really wanted to be able to do a really good job.”
Starting out as a second grade teacher, Cunningham has worked with most grades, but is retiring as a sixth grade teacher. Even though she has been in the field for many years, she still has the same passion as when she first started. “I loved teaching and I really enjoyed all these classes. Like anything, it has its good parts and bad parts but overall it’s been wonderful.”
Cunningham says she’ll miss working with the amazing teaching staff at Carle Place.
“I have to say I was very fortunate. I had great colleagues. They were all fantastic,” she says. “I have a lot of great friends and colleagues here.”
Joining Cunningam in retirement from Rushmore is Joyce Ragon, a special education teacher. She ends her career after 32 years in the education system; 25 of which were at Rushmore.
She says the relationships she’s made with her students are one of her most valuable memories.
“There are some students that you just make a connection with. They’ll always say hello and always talk to you. You know because you’ve created that bond. So those are the things that stick with us,” she says.
Ragon says that her mother was one of her inspirations to join the education field.
“My mother was a teacher and I remember going into school with her a couple times. I saw my mother was very happy and I liked working with children. I thought it would be a good career,” she says.
Ragon does not intend, however, to make this the final goodbye.
“It’s a very special place, a warm, familiar atmosphere that we have here,” Ragon said. “So, you know, that’s going to be hard to say goodbye to. We’ll keep coming back to parties and things like that so they won’t forget us.”
She says she’ll miss the people she’s worked with over the years, but that she’s looking forward to retirement.
“It’s the people, our friends that we work with, our colleagues,” Ragon says. “Everyone has been so happy for us and a little jealous too. But they’re happy for us and they know we’re ready. We know we’re ready, had a great career, and a great run here. We’re just ready to embark on other things in our lives.”
