By KEN CARPENTER
Great Bend Post
Two staff members at Lincoln Elementary School were honored Monday night by the Great Bend School Board for helping a student who was choking.
Teacher assistant Autumn Weingrad and school nurse Libbie Merritt were given the school district's R.O.S.E. award which stands for Recognizing Outstanding Support of Education.
Last month, Weingrad noticed a student in distress in Lincoln's cafeteria. The boy was choking on a chicken nugget. Misty Straub, Lincoln's principal, told school board members what happened next.
“She used her quick thinking and some of her previous training to assess him very quickly,” Straub said.
Weingrad walked the boy to the office where he was treated by Merritt. It took two separate efforts for Merritt to dislodge the food.
Straub presented Weingrad and Merritt with plaques provided by the school board.
"First of all, Autumn, I’m so proud of you,” Straub commented. “You took the time to notice there was a situation that we thought was minor that turned into something big and used your knowledge to help him and get him to our school nurse who could perform the Heimlich maneuver on him and probably save his life. So I’m very proud of these two ladies and what they did to save one of our students.”
The R.O.S.E. award was created to recognize individuals or groups for their services to Great Bend's school district.