As most of you know, my sister Heidi lives with Brain Cancer. She is such a positive person and very passionate about the medical field. She has been in the medical field very many,many,many years. My sister has applied with what was then called the Clarita Career College back in late June and was offered a job as a Mod A Medical Teacher to start I believe that August. When she was told in July of 2007 that she had Brain Cancer she made the decision to turn down the position due to her health and to focus on radiation. After radiation and her long recovery of developed Cushing Syndromes in April of 2008 my sister was ready to go back to work. So she re-applied at the same school and right away they remembered her and offered her a job immediately. They had at that time changed the name of the school to Charter College. My sister's goal in life has always been to try to impact others. Even more so when she was diagnosed. She truly believed in her students and was determined to make a difference in at least 1 students life. My sister had to make a hard decision within this past month to stop working. She has been overwhelmed with lots of work, that again she is very dedicated to accomplish. But by dedicating so much of her time, she has not been able to have her much needed rest to keep her body from not being tired. Per Dr.s orders, she has been forced to have to pretty much retire from work at this time. Thursday October 29th was her last day of teaching her last MOD A class. The Director at the school had advised my sister to let the students leave at 12pm instead of 1:30pm that day. My sister having meetings a lot with this job just assumed there was going to be a staff meeting. Once the students left the director came in and my sister was starting to pack her box up. The director told her, Heidi just leave this for now and come with me. When my sister walked out of her classroom on the 2nd floor of the school. She was greeted with over 200 students and staff lining the hallways and stairways of not only the 2nd floor but the 1st floor of the school as well. She has students that she taught from when she first started that didn't even attend the school anymore because they had already graduated all the way to students that were still presently enrolled. The great thing about my sisters position is, when you go to this school My sister is the first instructor for EVERY student for the first 5 weeks. Then the students are disbursed to the field in which they are going to school for. My sisters job was to make an impact in each students life for them to know that they can follow there dreams if the medical field was what there dream was. Apparently from the moment my sister gave her notice of resignation the school had been pulling together to have this Farewell put together for her. Apparently there was so many people that they had to have more than 10 Costco cakes present at the gathering. My sister was honored with a Scholarship that was placed in her honor. Called the Heidi Christpherson Scholarship. She will be meeting with the administrators soon to discuss what qualifications will need to be met in order to obtain this scholarship.
Heidi......I am soo PROUD to call you my sister and just as much as you inspire me in my own person life with your hardships, struggles, and life changes. You can now see that YES you have accomplished exactly what you sought out to do in life. Which was to IMPACT others. This day your final day of work goes to show just how many peoples lives you indeed did Impact. I love you. Here is a link to the entire article that was posted at her school. Please take a moment to read it and be just as touched as I was. I have posted some pics but the rest are on the web page on the slide show.
