December 8th, 2009
Hansen named TCTA trustee of the year

TCTA honoree Kathy Hansen.

STAFF REPORT

The Texas Classroom Teachers Association (TCTA) recently announced that San Marcos CISD Trustee Kathy Hansen has been chosen as School Board Member of the Year for Texas. She was nominated by the local chapter and will get official recognition at the annual TCTA conference in Forth Worth in February.

Hansen was elected to the school board in 2007 and serves as the board secretary. Her commitment to education has spanned her 32 years as educator, serving as a teacher, a Reading/Dyslexia Coordination, Director of Special Education and an Assistant principle of San Marcos High School. Thirty of those teaching years were spent at San Marcos CISD working with students, teachers, parents from kindergarten through high school. She worked with ten different superintendent and numerous board members during her tenure.

After retiring from the district, she started working for the federal government’s Social Security Administration as a disability specialist. She remains active in San Marcos CISD reading to classes, helping with Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS) testing and doing extensive reading recovery tutoring. She is a frequent attendee at district functions from sports to concerts to academic competitions to recovery program graduations.

Local TCTA president Grace Mueller said, “Many teachers, after retirement, look forward to other activities. Kathy Hansen jumped back into her passion: San Marcos CISD and its students. She has become known as a teacher and student advocate.”

Hansen and her husband John raised two children, Jeremy and Meghan,  in San Marcos schools from kindergarten through high school.  She serves as Eucharistic Minister at Texas State’s Catholic Center and is a frequent volunteer with many organizations in San Marcos.

Hansen earned her bachelor’s degree in education from Stephen F, Austin State University and her master’s in education from Northern Arizona State University. She did post graduate work at the University of Texas and Texas State, where she earned her Mid-Manangement Certification. In 2002, she served on the Oxford Round Table studying the future of education with a group of international educators at Oxford University in England.

Said San Marcos CISD Superintendent Patty Shafer, “This is a well-deserved honor. We are proud of Kathy and all that she does, and has done, for San Marcos CISD.”