KINDER WINNERS TO BE NAMED TODAY

Ten teachers from Cape Girardeau schools will be pegged to receive a combined $100,000 in awards for excellence when winners of the first annual Edna C. Kinder Excellence in Teaching Awards are announced today.

Dr. Jerry Kinder, a retired general surgeon and Cape Girardeau resident, will join schools superintendent Dr. Dan Steska to announce the award winners in a news conference at 4 p.m. at the Board of Education office, 61 N. Clark. A small reception will be held following the event.

Kinder and his brother, Richard, a former area attorney and the current head of a gas pipeline business headquartered in Houston, Texas, created the awards in memory of their late mother, a longtime special-education teacher at May Greene Elementary School.

Each award recipient will later in the school year receive a $10,000 check for their personal use. The siblings plan to present 10 Kinder awards annually to selected teachers from the Kinder Family Trust, a multimillion-dollar charitable foundation they established about three years ago.

All teachers were allowed to nominate one colleague, and each principal could nominate one or more teachers for the award. Recipients were chosen from a field of more than 70 teachers nominated by their peers and selected by a committee that included building principals, Steska and Jerry Kinder.

"I thought there were some good nominees," Kinder said. "I think they all had wonderful work ethics and tended to spend extra time with the students." Kinder said the recipients all shared a dedication and love for their students that was easily recognized.

School administrators are not eligible to receive the award, and teachers may not receive the award more often than once every five years. Kinder said the nomination process was restricted because educators are best able to recognize excellence among their peers.

"We all felt probably the fellow teachers knew as much about one another and their work habits and dedication," he said.

There is no specific selection of teachers by building, division or umber of years of service in teaching or in the district. The sole criteria for the award are outstanding teaching success and positive impact on children.

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