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Katy Burt, treasured teacher to the end
By JON HOORNSTRA
I readily concede a measure of bias that favors teachers, most likely because I married one long ago. It's a background fact I reveal in fairness to readers.
Bias aside, I can't think of any group outside the family unit that wields more influence on our children than school teachers. Their impact is unique, in part, because it is both immediate and long-term. Children go home filled by each day's activity and, years later, draw on some of those same lessons, even unconsciously, to make adult decisions. This makes teaching a noble profession of enormous responsibility.
But the loss of a teacher sometimes makes the point more profoundly, even painfully. On Feb. 24, well over 300 friends of the late Katy Burt created a standing-room-only scene of tears and smiles at Eisenhower Elementary School's auditorium. There, her friends, family and colleagues had gathered to grieve at her passing and celebrate her countless contributions to education.
For those just tuning in, Katy was a respected kindergarten teacher in the Cupertino school system. She began in 1967 and retired in 1991, but she remained deeply involved in district affairs for several more years. She influenced children in powerful and good ways. At best, one column such as this can only touch on them. There are two stories that will help.
The first is a story of the unlikely connection between 5-year-olds and architecture.
Many kindergartners will someday recall that their first awareness of what great architecture is was in kindergarten, thanks to Katy Burt. It was her discovery of "archiblocks" that for many kids was their first opportunity to play and build with both familiar and exotic geometric shapes.
"Katy knew children must build things to learn," former colleague and Montclaire teacher Dale Edwards recalled. "So she discovered architectural building blocks to fill that need."
How do you introduce architecture via "archiblocks" to kindergartners? Burt gathered them in a half-circle in front of her and showed them a collection of magnificent wood blocks with classic architectural shapes, e.g., Russian, Greek, Gothic and Roman designs. Speaking slowly, she then told them in detail the story behind the blocks: carefully cut by a man in Vermont in a workshop surrounded by trees, using only the best hardwoods. With the image of the Vermont craftsman in mind, the kids treated the blocks like gold.
Longtime colleagues, like Regnart school's Barbara Bayha and Sedgwick's Gail Randolph, recall that Burt was always ready to help other teachers, with time, advice or material.
"She constantly collected things other teachers might someday use," Randolph remembered. "She filled two commercial storage rooms."
Burt's science vision "was one that made Cupertino a leader in the area of hands-on science," according to Louise Wiest, the school district's science resource teacher. Katy pioneered a "science kit," to solve every teacher's problem of having everything needed at the right place and time to teach science. The plastic "tubs," with everything inside, ended the annual scramble for materials.
Teachers who speak of Katy Burt agree she was a "teacher's teacher." Understandably, they appreciate some of her contributions in ways people outside teaching might not notice.
I noticed Katy Burt in a more ordinary way, followed by a sad turn. We sat in the bleachers on Feb. 20 to watch Monta Vista's varsity baseball team play its first game. Susan Latshaw, mother of varsity player Ryan Latshaw, sat on my right and my wife, Terri, on my left. As Ryan moved into the "on deck" batter's circle, his mother turned to Terri to say, "one of Ryan's favorite teachers was Katy Burt. She was wonderful."
That this happened as we sat in a ballpark 11 years after the batter had left kindergarten is powerful testament to the influence of a good teacher. Then, the sad turn. A telephone message was waiting at home to tell us the batter's one-time teacher had died.
Someone transcribed a quote from Katy Burt onto a bookmark that offers a memorable insight into how she did her job. "If a child does not learn the way you teach," she said, "then teach the way he learns."
Katy Burt (1925-1999) taught the way they learned. And so they learned.
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Cupertino, California Since 1947
