A Legacy of Learning

    Kathy Ann Kuhlmann, an exceptional teacher and administrator, leaves a legacy of learning that is surpassed by few in the Greater Baton Rouge Area. Her teaching career spanned thirty-four years in East and West Baton Rouge Parishes and the state of Texas. 
    Ms. Kuhlmann came to the Central Community Schools as a sixth grade Social Studies teacher in 1987. She brought with her a set of standards and expectations for students, staff, faculty, administration, and friends. She included everyone in her belief of what was right and wrong and in her belief that a student with desire could overcome any obstacles and learn anything placed before him/her. This article is a tribute to her memory and to all that she held great: love of God, love of country, and love of friends and family in a world in which education reigned supreme. She believed in shaping and molding students to strive for excellence. She expected greatness of her students and she received greatness. Together, she and her students sailed the ships of excellence: Scholarship, Leadership, and Citizenship. She was the epitome of interdisciplinary and across-the-curricula teaching, as many who knew her will remember the tremendous school-wide efforts put into her Geography Awareness units of study which left no stone unturned, no subject untouched across the curricula.
    After many years at Central Middle School as a mentor, teacher, and educator, Ms. Kuhlmann continued her teaching career as an Assistant Principal at Southeast Middle School in EBR and later moved to open a brand new school, Woodlawn Middle, as part of one of the first all women administrations to open a new middle school in EBR Parish. Her impact continued at Central Middle School where the many programs and standards she authored and implemented during her tenure went forward with those she mentored in the classrooms and in the administrative offices. 
    On April 25, 2014, the Greater Baton Rouge educational community at-large lost a great teacher. Ms. Kuhlmann succumbed to her battle with pancreatic cancer. She will be sorely missed by the entire educational community throughout the Greater Baton Rouge area in which she served so diligently and so tirelessly for the past 27 of the 34 consecutive years of her life dedicated to the education of our youth. Her legacy of education and excellence will live on through the establishment of The Kathy Kuhlmann Woodlawn Way Award given to a deserving Woodlawn Middle School Eighth Grade Student at the end of each school year. Shortly after her death, Woodlawn Middle School Administration and Faculty paid tribute to her memory with the institution of this award and honored its first recipient at their awards program in May, 2014. Ms. Kuhlmann’s picture and Award Plaque with the recipients’ names will hang on Woodlawn Middle’s walls memorializing what Ms. Kuhlmann represented in life and in education.
    While teachers and administrators will miss her presence in the schools, students will miss her loving, yet stern, no-nonsense approach to all of life’s tasks. Anyone can show up and take another’s place, but filling the shoes of Kathy Ann Kuhlmann will be a much greater task. Only those striving for excellence in inspiring students to learn can hope to walk in those shoes.
    The East Baton Rouge, West Baton Rouge, Texas, and Central Community Schools educational communities and students will greatly miss her presence among them, but the legacy of Kathy Ann Kuhlmann is inspiration for all students and teachers to strive toward educational excellence in her wake.