Students and staff remember the life of a much-loved teacher gone much too soon
Goodbyes should never come so soon, so without warning, so permanently. Students and staff suffered a tragic loss on January 4 when English teacher Katie Husain lost her battle with brain cancer. Passionate for her subject and compassionate for her family of students, she leaves a hole that can only be endured but never filled.
K. Husain was a long term substitute for Ms. Griffith when she started her journey at West in the 2018-19 school year. She then joined the English department going into the 2019-20 school year for her first full-time teaching position.
“For a first-year teacher, she was really impressive,” English teacher Amy Karoses said. “She was constantly researching and finding new resources and bringing new ideas to the table. For someone who had been teaching this curriculum for years, it was great to have a person with a new perspective.”
She used her intellectual abilities outside of the classroom as well. Her husband, Jeremy Husain, saw this when they would go out to put their knowledge to the test.
“We used to go to different restaurants and compete in trivia,” he said. “They would always include questions about literature and she took those upon herself. There were some nights where I was along for the ride because she was so confident in her answers. I only came in useful when it came to the history and sports questions.”
K. Husain wanted to use her knowledge to help her students and herself go above and beyond their limits. This was apparent to English teacher Shelby Brey as she got to know K. Husain as a teacher.
“She was always trying to challenge her students and she wanted to care for them and help them learn and grow,” she said. “She was the kind of person who was meant to impact the lives of students.”
K. Husain’s students felt her compassion first hand. Her love and care has brought them memories they will take with them even after their high school career. Junior Sam Koepsell looks back on being with her after a difficult time for our school and community.
“After the events on December 3 of 2019, I had her first hour on the day we finally came back to school,” he said. “She gave me a big hug and told me we were going to be okay. She told our whole class that we were brave for enduring the event and it really meant a lot coming from her.”
Her softheartedness exceeded past large events and carried into her day to day life. Junior Claire Garton experienced K. Husain’s empathy every time she walked into the classroom for homeroom.
“She would start homeroom by simply asking us about our lives and how we were doing,” she said. “I loved that she genuinely cared about us and about what we had going on. School is important, and we are here to learn, but you need to have times where you get to know someone and listen to what they have going on, and I think she really understood that.”
K. Husain’s range of impact spread beyond those inside the school, as she introduced J. Husain to the wide world of literature as she would for students.
“I had actually rarely read before I met Katie,” he said. “But she helped me to find some books that I started to enjoy. She would get so excited when a student did the same. She would tell me about students who never read but then got excited to tell her about a book they found.”
K. Husain had the same love for her community that she did for her students. Principal Erin Kohl, who supervises the English department, was happy to see K. Husain’s pride for her school.
“She was a student at West and we love to see our students blossom and stay in our school community which is exactly what she did,” she said. “She had always wanted to have a job working in her alma mater. She really bled blue and white.”
Losing someone who brought such joy to so many people is one of the hardest things to do. When it comes to K. Husain, the loss came sooner than what was expected. English teacher Scott Thurwatcher put together a video for K. Husain, not knowing how little time she had left.
“I wanted to do something for her that showed her that she was a part of the family and that she belonged with us,” he said. “The beginning of the school year got so busy so it didn’t end up happening until November. Little did I know that less than two short months later she would be gone.”
When someone learns that another person is going through a tragic event it can be devastating.
“Over the summer Mrs. Husain was supposed to go to a socially distant lunch with myself and a few other women in the English department when she sent me a text letting me know she couldn’t make it,” Brey said. “Obviously to get that text it was really shocking because it was something to do with her brain. The school year was starting and we were finding out that she had brain cancer and that all of this was taking a turn.”
When someone falls ill, there can be a million questions that come to mind; one of those questions tends to be if the person will recover. Finding out that a person has passed due to an illness can be just as memorable as the person themselves.
“The news that she had passed away was kind of a total shock and just immediate sadness and pain for her family,” Brey said. “I had found out when I was sitting in my car about to leave to go somewhere and another teacher had texted me and told me and I just sat in the car and cried and didn’t go anywhere.”
Both the staff and students experience the event from a different perspective but English teacher Michelle Huettl gives advice on how we can all work together to cope.
“One of the things people tend to do when dealing with grief, whether before a loss happens or once it does, is isolate themselves,” she said. “But staying connected is hugely important. Talking about it has been really helpful and I think just accepting the way we’re feeling when we’re feeling it means that there are parts of it that are hard, but important. We shouldn’t feel guilty for laughing at a memory or story. She wouldn’t want anyone to feel guilty about continuing to enjoy things and so keeping that in mind will help us all work through this.”
Staying connected can be important for people to offer support in a time of grief, but Thurwatcher understands that not everyone faces every situation the same.
“We can’t force people to move in the same way,” he said. “We have to let everyone cope at their own pace but also knowing we have that strength and support behind us and know we are really all in this together helps us be able to get through it.”
The way we remember someone can also help in the healing process. J. Husain gave some insight on how K. Husain would want to be remembered.
“When she was sick, she lost a lot of her ability to function,” he said. “But she wouldn’t want people to remember her as she was when she was sick. She would want people to think of her as her happy self with her big smile.”
Though her time at West was short, she left an impression on the school that will be remembered long into the future.
“I think it's meaningful and purposeful to share our stories of her and the impact that she had on us,” Brey said. “Her impact on her students and at West is not something that will be forgotten.”
By Sophie Burke
Oshkosh West Index Volume 117 Issue IV
February 1st 2021