Sue Agnew

Dear friends in Christ,

Anna Julia Haywood Cooper was born enslaved in 1858, and soon after the Civil War ended began her education at St. Augustine Normal School and Collegiate Institute (a school founded by the Episcopal Church to educate African-American teachers and clergy). She insisted on her right to take courses reserved for male students, and eventually earned degrees in mathematics at Oberlin College. Her career was spent in teaching, school administration, writing, and actively advocating for equal education for African Americans. 

At the same time I was reading about Anna, I saw an obituary of a woman I had known for a few years when I was in my early 30s, Lyn Hennion. At that time, Lyn was Development Director at a private high school in the Bay Area and I was the typesetter at a print shop, where we printed her monthly news magazine for the school. She treated me as a collaborator, actively seeking my input, and I credit her with empowering me to go on to eventually work in publications and communications. Throughout her career Lyn was active in and on the boards of various organizations and programs promoting education for all age groups and income levels.

Anna and Lyn were alike in their commitment to the rights of everyone to have access to education. They were also alike in that they taught by example.

On a recent Arizona Illustrated episode featuring StoryCorps, the narrator recalled interviewing a mother and daughter. The daughter had been an invalid from childhood including having coded four times. At the time of the interview, the mother was going through breast cancer treatment, and said she knew how to fight because she had watched her daughter fight so many times.

Can you recall someone who taught you an important lesson, not in a class but through their relationship with you?

Has anyone every credited you with teaching THEM something, even though that wasn’t your intention?

Kind of a scary thought, isn’t it! Big responsibility!

“Let no one despise your youth, but set the believers an example in speech and conduct, in love, in faith, in purity … Pay close attention to yourself and to your teaching; continue in these things, for in doing this you will save both yourself and your hearers.” (1 Timothy 4: 12, 16)

Yours in Christ,

—Sue