And while the responsibilities of everyday life and raising a family may have delayed the process, Sparrer realized that goal when, 11 years after her graduation from Leigh High School, she earned her bachelor of arts degree from San José State University in 1989 and went on to become a highly respected elementary school teacher in the San Jose Unified School District.

Sparrer died Sept. 21 at the age of 52 after a five-month battle with colon cancer, but not before she touched the lives of hundreds of students and their families, particularly at Terrell Elementary School in San Jose.

Sparrer was born in Petaluma, Calif., on Feb. 27, 1950, and moved to San Jose in 1959, becoming a fourth-grader at Carlton Elementary School. She attended Dartmouth Middle School in San Jose and was a member of Leigh High School's class of 1968, a cheerleader and an honor student.

In 1969, as a student at West Valley Community College, then in Campbell, she met her future husband, Dick Sparrer, and they were married on Nov. 28, 1970.

Soon afterward she had to leave school to go to work. Their first son, Michael, was born in 1976, and in 1982 their second son, Kevin, was born. Randee Sparrer left work to care for her children and ran a day care service out of their San Jose home.

When her children began school, Sparrer went back to school herself, studying and continuing to operate her day care business. In 1989 she earned her B.A. in education and her teaching credential, and in 1991 she was hired as a full-time teacher by San Jose Unified.

She taught kindergarten, special education and a bilingual class at Terrell Elementary School, then taught in the upper elementary grades at Hester Elementary School for four years. In 1996 she returned to Terrell, where she team-taught fourth and fifth grade for two years with fellow teacher Linda Hirschbach, now the principal of Anne Darling Elementary School.

"It was one of the most fantastic experiences that I think a person can have in the teaching profession," said Hirschbach of those two years. "Randee was a born teacher; she just had a knack with the kids."

Hirschbach described how the two would meet on Sundays, while Dick Sparrer wrote stories as the sports editor for the Silicon Valley Community Newspapers. The two would intend to spend only a couple of hours together but usually ended up meeting in the morning and leaving late in the afternoon, she said, after having come up with interesting ideas to make subjects come alive for their students.

"We were both really willing to try new and different approaches," Hirschbach said, and described times when Randee Sparrer brought liverwurst and Chinese food to class so the children could better understand references to them in the children's book The Cricket in Times Square. "She was always willing to go that extra mile for the kids and expose them to things that normally teachers didn't want to do."

Sparrer was also dedicated to the school's afterschool GATE (Gifted and Talented Education) program and worked well with new teachers, helping them to understand how to handle students' different backgrounds and learning styles, Hirschbach said. During the 1999­00 school year, Sparrer was named Terrell's teacher of the year.

"Teaching was what she always wanted to do," Dick Sparrer said. "She knew it when she was originally going to school. She was just wonderful with children, and she was a much-beloved teacher at Terrell by students, parents and teachers alike. She was just a wonderful person."

"She was a great role model," Hirschbach said. "She was so much a part of everything she did. Randee was like my sister. We were kindred spirits."

Sparrer was also very involved in her children's lives, welcoming their friends into her home for special and everyday events alike.

"It was one of those places where everyone felt comfortable," Hirschbach said.

She said that Randee Sparrer helped out at Terrell while her sons attended the school, before she was a teacher. She also worked at the Pioneer High School snack shack during her sons' football games and even helped Michael with table decorations for a fraternity party.

"I think of her as an incredible contributor to our community," said Ardie Julien-Heinrich, former principal of Pioneer. "She was an extraordinarily hard worker and always followed through on every commitment. She was just a very fun person to know."

"She always had time for everything," Hirschbach said. "Her family came first. And Dick wasn't only her husband; he was her friend. They were a dynamite couple."

Sylvia Bickenbach, principal at Terrell while Randee Sparrer taught there, described Sparrer as "humble, calm and patient - she had this smile and she had this quiet, dry sense of humor. She was a mentor to all of us, including the principal - she was a leader in every dimension of education, and people just sought her out because she was always there."

"I thought she was just an incredibly inspiring person; she was making a difference everywhere she went," added Bickenbach, a Saratoga resident. "The number of lives she's touched in a big way - it's humbling."

In addition to her husband, Dick, and their sons, Michael and Kevin, Randee Sparrer is survived by her parents, Art and Gretchen Lichau of San Jose; her sister, Judy Schultz of Rainier, Wash.; and her brother, Gary Lichau of San Jose.

A celebration of Randee Sparrer's life will be held Oct. 13 at 4:30 p.m. at the First Congregational Church in San Jose, 1980 Hamilton Ave. In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to the GATE program at Terrell Elementary School; checks should be payable to the San Jose Unified School District and sent to Terrell Elementary School, 3295 Pearl Ave., San Jose, 95136.