More than soccer moms

Alicia Robinson

Gail Hedrick and Mary Kanotz could accurately be called soccer moms,

but that would leave out so many of the other things they do. The two

were honored last week at Kaiser Elementary School for their

volunteer work helping children in the schools and the community.

Hedrick and Kanotz each received the school district’s Martha

Fluor Service Award, named after a school board member who was its

first recipient in 1995.

Both women have been volunteering for years and have given an

impressive amount of time as soccer coaches and referees, chaperons

and helpers at school fieldtrips and fundraisers, and as members of

Kaiser’s Parent Faculty Organization.

Kanotz said she got started as a volunteer through the American

Youth Soccer Organization, where she donated her time to teach kids

to play soccer. Volunteering also is a family tradition, she said.

“It just kind of seemed logical to do all the things I’d seen my

mother doing,” she said.

Her sister, Jennifer Luckey, who presented the award, agreed that

theirs is a family of helpers.

“She must get this from being one of seven children,” Luckey said.

“You always helped out any way you could.”

Hedrick began working in the classroom when her oldest son,

Carson, was in kindergarten. She got involved with the Parent Faculty

Organization and things snowballed from there, she said.

“The more you do, the more you get asked to do,” she said.

In addition to her volunteer work and raising her two sons,

Hedrick has held a variety of jobs, but she squeezes it all in

because she enjoys what she’s doing.

“I like being able to use skills that I don’t use in my job or my

home life,” she said. “I love seeing the smiles on the kids’ faces

and just making a difference.”

Some of those smiles and the activities that generate them

wouldn’t be possible without the work of people like Hedrick and

Kanotz, said Kim Newett, president of Kaiser’s Parent Faculty

Organization.

“They’ve just dedicated themselves to the kids of the community,”

Newett said.