Two staff members at area schools have been named Everyday Heroes by the Upper Grand District School Board.
Centre Wellington District High School’s Kim Sonnet is a child and youth counsellor at the school and OPP constable Steven Wing is a school resource officer at Norwell District Secondary School.
A board press release lists the criteria for the annual awards as: “performance at a high level at all times, a significant school or system-related achievement, a specific innovation or achievement of significant value or importance to the system, or a unique circumstance worthy of recognition by the board.”
This year 11 recipients were chosen out of 38 nominees.
Kim Sonnet
Sonnet told the Advertiser she was surprised to receive an Everyday Hero award.
“I really feel like I just come and do my job,” she said. “That’s part of what I need to do to serve the students that I work with and I love my job …
“I don’t really consider myself to be a hero in that sense. I think more of like firefighters and police officers and people like that as being everyday heroes.”
This is Sonnet’s fifth year at Centre Wellington District High School in Fergus, where she is the only child and youth counsellor.
“I support students with social and emotional needs,” she said.
School principal and nominator Chad Warren said Sonnet is responsible for more than 1,200 students at the school.
“She has a pretty high case load,” he said. “But above and beyond that she does a lot of things for the school which you wouldn’t see some individuals do in her role.
“She does extracurricular stuff. She’s here for prom, she supervises dances, she organizes activities for the kids, she’s involved with anti-bullying projects.”
Guidance counsellor Heather Ginzel said Sonnet shows up whenever volunteers are needed.
“At lunchtime we serve students food, she’s out there every day making the connections,” Ginzel said.
It’s those relationships Sonnet works hard to foster.
“I really think that it’s important for me as a child and youth worker to make myself visible so I want to be accessible to all students in the school,” she said.
“I want to decrease the stigma that’s attached to people who might need to come and see me.”
Sonnet is also involved in the school’s safe committee, which offers programs like pink day and pride week at the end of June.
Ginzel uses the terms humble and selfless to describe Sonnet, who recently worked with the Canadian Mental Health Association and the Wellington County OPP to promote and reinforce digital safety and citizenship with Grade 9 students.
“I really think that every child and youth worker working within our board deserves this award,” Sonnet said. “Because I think we all go above and beyond and I don’t think you can do this job without having a passion and a love for the youth.”
Steven Wing
Wing was also surprised he won the award.
“I didn’t expect it,” he told the Advertiser. “I’m very, I guess, appreciative and overwhelmed with the fact that I did win the award.”
This is Wing’s second year at Norwell as the school’s resource officer and he says he’s at the school almost every day.
“The only thing that pulls me out of here is basically court or any type of emergency thing that happens out in the community … and any training I have,” he said.
“I’m … here over probably 80% of the year at least.”
Wing said his role at Norwell is quite varied.
“Obviously first and foremost I’m here for safety,” he said.
His presence is important to Grade 12 student and nominator Jake Bloemberg.
“It just gives us that sense that someone’s there and he does do a good job making sure all the police issues are solved,” Bloemberg said.
But it’s the connection with the students that Wing said he likes to focus on.
“When we were growing up the only time you’d meet a police officer … or the first time, is when you get pulled over in your car and it’s not necessarily a positive experience at that point in time,” Wing explained.
“I go out of my way to try to build a lot of bridges with the youth … and show them that we’re not a negative part of society.”
Bloemberg said one of the reasons he nominated Wing is because he’s approachable.
“He’s always around the school, he’s always a friendly person … and he’s good at his job and he goes above and beyond just to know everyone and be there for you,” Bloemberg said.
Teacher Sarrah Beemer, another one of Wing’s nominators, said he works in a proactive way.
“I just see that he has become … part of our school community,” she said. “We refer to Norwell as having like a family and he’s friendly and outgoing to all of our students and I think there’s a noticeable difference with him in our building.”
Wing said he also goes into civic and law classes at the school to talk to students about law, policing and courtroom proceedings.
Of the law classes Wing said, “a lot of times there’s at least three to four youth in that class that want to become police officers so I start helping them out.”
Wing has been an OPP officer since January 2002 but Norwell is his first school placement.
“I applied for this position,” he said. “I had looked into it years ago thinking that I might like it. I enjoy the interaction with the youth and getting to know them and helping them through any of their struggles here.”
One of the ways Wing helps them, beyond his duties as the school’s resource officer, is through coaching cross country and helping the school’s running club.
“I’m a runner through and through,” Wing said.
“That’s my passion but running helped me through high school … you remember back where you make mountains out of the mole hills and then you get older and you realize that wasn’t really that big of a deal … running helped me through all that stuff, any stresses I had and that’s how I relieve stress now is run.”
But Wing said he doesn’t do any of his work for recognition.
“I come to work, I do my job and you know what?” he said. “I can look myself in the mirror and go to sleep and I’m happy.”
Ceremony
Sonnet and Wing were joined by fellow county Everyday Hero award winners Tara Armstrong of Victoria Terrace Public School in Fergus and Lynn Clack of Rockwood Centennial Public School, along with seven other board recipients, at an awards ceremony at E. L. Fox Auditorium at John F. Ross CVI in Guelph on May 30.
