Man knoweth not the price thereof;
neither is it found in the land of the living.
(Job 28:13)
Sandra Kay (White) Nunley attended the University of Tennessee from 1966 to 1972. She graduated in June 1972 with a B. S. She received her professional certification in September 1972. She returned to UT in the summer of 1974 through 1975 for additional coursework, receiving credit for 45 hours.
From 1974 through 1981 Sandra worked for the Douglas-Cherokee and Mountain Valley EOA Headstart programs in Sevier, Claiborne, Campbell and Union counties.
In 1981 Sandra began working as a speech therapist for the Union County Schools. She initially served both Big Ridge and Luttrell Elementary schools. I first made her acquaintance in the fall of 1987 when I began teaching at Luttrell.
My first impression of Ms. Nunley was that she was “mysterious.” It’s not so much what she said as what her facial and body language indicated as unsaid. I never exactly knew what she thought of me in the beginning, and perhaps she was trying to figure me out. Regardless, there always seemed to be a lot of thinking going on, and while her eyes indicated appraisal, they never betrayed her actual thought process.
As the years went on, I became more acquainted socially on a limited basis with Ms. Nunley. There was a group of teachers at Luttrell who often went out to eat, and we became self-termed as “The Tea Drinkers.”
The group initially began with teachers from Luttrell, but occasionally a friend from another school was included.
Professionally, educational time marched on, and Ms. Nunley again pursued additional coursework from Lincoln Memorial University. She received her M.Ed. degree in December 1992. In 1993, she assumed the position she would hold for the remainder of her career—Supervisor of Special Education for the Union County Schools.
During 1993-1994, Sandra Nunley, Deanie Carver and I formed a team and attended LMU’s Ed.S. program. The camaraderie we enjoyed helped us bear the burden of simultaneously working full-time for the school system and pursuing an advanced degree.
There are memories of that time I will never forget. I remember us all sitting around Ms. Carver’s dining room table, working on a project that was to receive a measure of acclaim from both the president of LMU and former Knoxville City Schools Superintendent Dr. Fred Bedelle, Dean of the Ed.S. program.
Dr. Bedelle praised Ms. Carver and Sandra, then asked me, “What’d you do to help, Ronnie? Take them coffee?”
There was another time of working on the Ed.S. that the three of us met at my house. We drove in something of a convoy—me first, followed by Ms. Carver in her car, then Sandra in her car. We marched straight to the table and commenced our work. In a few short minutes the front door of my house opened, and one of my neighbors, an elected official, peeked around the kitchen doorway to see what he could see. I don’t know if he was pleased or disappointed, but I can assure you we could not possibly have looked exciting or as if we were having an unusual high ol’ time!
There’s another time when it was my Saturday to drive to class. My car stalled right in the middle of Cumberland Gap Parkway in the path of oncoming traffic. If you ever needed proof that God takes care of fools, you now have it.
A most interesting incident occurred on another Saturday. A major paper was due to be turned in. The three of us met on this particular Saturday at 6 a.m. at the old central office next to Maynardville Elementary’s playground.
We made five copies of that paper—one for each of us, one for a lady from Campbell County who was in our study group, and one to turn in. It was Sandra’s day to drive to LMU, and we were confidently taking notes in class. I decided I had better get the paper ready to hand in.
I did not have the paper or the copies! Neither did Ms. Carver, nor Sandra. In a panic, thinking that surely we must have inadvertently left the paper at the central office, Sandra drove back to Maynardville from LMU. The paper was nowhere to be found. All that remained was a few pages that we had discarded that had not copied properly. Sandra even looked inside the incinerator. We pleaded our cause to Dr. Bedelle, and he had mercy, allowing us to turn it in at the next class. Yours truly rewrote the paper, though it was not nearly as good as the original, and we all managed to graduate with our Ed.S. degrees from LMU in December 1994.
(We all believed we knew what happened to that paper, and I still feel it “in my bones” that one day it will materialize. There are many stories of things that disappeared in the central office over the years, though that problem seems to have disappeared gradually over time. Maybe the central office ghosts like us better now than then!)
School began in fall 1995 with a new name and address for Sandra. She was now Sandra Kay White Nunley Price, and she had moved from Valley View to Fountain Gate.
I was “out of fellowship” at that time with The Tea Drinkers (someday the reasons might make for a good article), so I was as surprised as anyone else.
Sandra could be most accommodating to her friends. I give her partial credit for my assignment as a central office supervisor.
After a few difficult years of board member/director changes, a time during which I held five different positions for five years in a row, I let Sandra know that I would like to come to the central office. She put in a good word for me with then Director Charles Thomas, and for that I will always be grateful.
Sandra could also turn a very cold shoulder when she felt offended. Due to a couple of decisions I made with which she did not agree, I was banned from The Tea Drinkers group. Sandra always had a “just-so” way of letting me know the group had met and that I had been excluded.
That was the nature of my friendship with Ms. Price. There were many times during the 36 years I knew her that I was merely an acquaintance, sometimes a good friend, occasionally a black sheep, and back again. Sandra was a private person, and there were limits to how close she would allow any friendship to become. There are many stories that I could tell about our acquaintance if space and time permitted. Maybe someday you can read it in my book, if it ever gets written.
Regardless of circumstances, our friendship persevered. In 2007 Sandra asked me to write her a letter of recommendation. I never considered for a moment that she seriously considered leaving the Union County Schools—I felt more like she wanted to know and have validation of my opinion of her professionally. Following is the body of that letter of recommendation I wrote for her at her request:
I have known Mrs. Price continuously since the fall of 1987. As the first person to hold the position of Supervisor of Special Education for the Union County Public Schools, Mrs. Price has developed that department into a most effective component of the county’s public education system. Among Mrs. Price’s many accomplishments was the formation of the Union County Developmental Preschool and the Union County Alternative Learning Center.
Mrs. Price has written and received many grants that have furthered educational opportunities for the students of the Union County Schools, many stretching beyond the realms of special education, notably the establishment of Voluntary Pre-Kindergarten programs in three of the county’s four elementary schools. Mrs. Price constantly studies special education law and attends as many conferences as possible to keep abreast of changes in the law—this is without doubt the reason that the Union County Public School System has maintained such a low rate of special education litigation.
Mrs. Price is all about legality—Union County’s special education program consistently demonstrates compliance with state and federal law as monitoring records indicate. Mrs. Price, while an amiable person to work with, has no problem ensuring that special education decisions are legal and operate in the best interest of the child.
The thing I admire most about Sandra Price is that the phrase “the best interest of the child” is not just a catch phrase to her—it is the driving goal of her career. Mrs. Price knows practically every special education student and parent in Union County by sight, name and qualifying condition.
A story could be written about Sandra’s approximately quarter-of-a-century, hard-fought battle with cancer. Sandra won many of the battles, but ultimately was claimed by the war. The last day that Sandra was in the central office, she gave me a framed, signed picture of Union County’s last elected Superintendent of Schools, David F. Coppock. The picture was taken in the very office that was the last she was to occupy.
Also in that frame was one of Mr. Coppock’s signed campaign cards from his last election. I knew that day Sandra would not be returning to the job she’d held for 30 years, nor to the career she’d begun one year short of half a century ago. It was a memorable day of “lasts”—last elected superintendent, last election campaign, and the very last time I saw Sandra Kay White Nunley Price.
Perhaps that is the very spirit and nature of sincere friendship. Friends, like siblings, often disagree, and sometimes those disagreements lead to bitterness. I’ve heard it said that if you love something, set it free. If it returns, it’s yours, if not, it never was.
Sandra and I parted ways a few times throughout the years, times I thought we would never be friendly again. But we each came back.
The friendship was ours.