Scholarship established in memory of superintendent’s son

By TONY FYFFE

BSN Editor

LOUISA — Lawrence County Board of Education chairman Heath Preston announced at the group’s regular meeting Monday a scholarship in memory of Superintendent Dr. Robbie Fletcher’s son, Jacob, who died in February.

Preston said he and his family will donate $500 to the scholarship, which will be given to a student who continues his or her education at a career technical school. He encouraged others to donate to the scholarship as well so more than one student can benefit from the award.

Fletcher, who said he was unaware that Preston was going to make the announcement, said there have been several monetary donations made since his son’s death on Feb. 19.

“The staff took up fifteen-hundred dollars in honor of my son,” said Fletcher, who said he would like for the scholarship to be named Jacob’s Ladder. “We’ve also had other people to donate money to do things in his honor.”

Fletcher then addressed the issue of mental health awareness and how the school district needs to support students who struggle with depression and mental health issues.

“Mental health awareness is big,” Fletcher said. “It needs to be something that we do every single day. We are restructuring our guidance counselors to relieve them of a lot of their duties, the paperwork duties, that they have so they can be with kids more often. That’s something that’s here to stay.”

Fletcher shared an experience he had recently with a first-grade student when he went into the Blaine Elementary cafeteria to get a roll.

The girl “grabbed me by the waist, squeezed me as tight as she could — this is a first-grade student, folks — and she said, ‘I’m so sorry about your son, but I love you, but I know how you feel. My mom passed away,” Fletcher said.

“I went numb,” he said. “I literally did. She didn’t cry, she didn’t bat an eye lash She repeated it. ‘I’m sorry about your son, but I love you.” Squeezed me again and them she went and sat down.

“…That first-grade baby used her experience to look out after me. That’s tough, folks.”

Fletcher said he is seeing a Christian grief counselor who is “making me understand grief in a way that I can talk to kids about it.”

Later in the meeting, Fletcher said that the school district has partnered with Pathways to provide suicide prevention training for parents and community members. He said the local ministerial association is also offering similar training.

“We’ve already started training with our staff members,” he said.

In other business, Fletcher announced that he and his family are in the process of purchasing a house on Timberlake Drive. Fletcher, who currently lives in Martin County, noted that moving to Lawrence County was a condition of his contract when he was hired as superintendent eight years ago but that he had been unable to sell his house.

“I’m fulfilling that contract,” Fletcher said. “It’s just taken me eight years to do it, so I apologize for that.”