Educational assistant retires after 32 years

Bonnie McMillan with a retirement gift made for her by another educational assistant. Photo by Meaghan Bury, QNet News

By Meaghan Bury

TRENTON – Bonnie McMillan says she’s one of the lucky ones.

Not many people can say they love their job as much as she loved hers, says the 67-year-old educational assistant who retired this month after working with the Hastings and Prince Edward District School Board since 1984.

McMillan didn’t start out in the educational system, but at age 36 was drawn back to her childhood dream of being a teacher when she was offered a job at V.P. Carswell Public School in her hometown of Trenton.

Her first position was working one on one with a child in kindergarten who had osteoporosis. McMillan went on to spend 13 years at the school.

During these years her role was to support each child she was assigned but also to support all students in the classroom with any help they needed, and to assist the teacher.

McMillan continued in that role at Prince of Wales Public School in Belleville for four years. It was there she learned that small-group withdrawal – taking a few children at a time for extra help – made the difference in student performance, she said. She spent time with children who were slower learners and was able to personalize her teaching methods to help suit these students. She also ran an intermediate program that focused on storytelling.

McMillan left Prince of Wales to become one of two educational assistants in a pilot project driven by a speech pathologist to focus on helping children who had oral language difficulties. In the first year of the project she travelled between 11 schools in the district, spending half days at different ones.

The project was successful and became a permanent focus after the first year. McMillan says that’s where she knew she belonged: “I realized that’s what I wanted to continue to do.”

The number of children requiring support increased each year and the behaviours of students continued to change, so McMillan says she was always coming up with new strategies that would hold their attention and help them progress.

She was grateful that the schools were focusing on the importance of speech and language, and how oral-language difficulties affect a child’s learning, she said.

“I felt really happy that we were addressing the needs of students.”

She feels richly rewarded by seeing a student’s success and knowing that she was part of it, she said.

She knew she was making a difference, she said, when she had enough of an impact on a group of Grade 8 boys that they were looking forward to the next time they would be able to see her and finish what they were reading.

In addition to the students, McMillan said, she has worked with marvellous teachers. Retiring is bittersweet, she said.

It will be hard, she explained, because being an educator is an important part of who she is, and has defined her for 32 years. But she also feels like the time was right, despite how she will miss the kids, she said.

“I wanted to go out on a high, and I feel that I have.”