Final Chapter in a 42-Year Love Story
When Rio Hondo Elementary School lets out for summer break June 21, kindergarten teacher Doris Ann Walters will not only say goodby to her students, she will also bid farewell to the classroom in which she has taught for 38 years.
About 200 colleagues and former students will honor Walters today at a retirement party at the school on East Wildflower Road in Arcadia.
Walters has been a teacher with the El Monte City School District for 42 years, teaching first at Cherrylee Elementary School in El Monte. Then, when the district built Rio Hondo in an unincorporated area of Arcadia in 1952, she asked for a transfer to the new school, located around the corner from her home. “I walked to school for six years,” said Walters, who has since moved to another part of Arcadia.
“I’m just a teacher who loved doing what I did,” she said, adding that she never thought of teaching higher grades because her kindergartners “were curious about everything, and so willing to please.”
“It’s just a delightful age to be with. I’m going to miss them.”
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