Photo by Dede Biles/The Aiken Standard
The Aiken Standard’s 2017 Person of the Year isn’t a well-known public figure.
She isn’t a high-profile activist in the community, an elected official or an executive in a big company.
Instead, Sherida Stroman works quietly behind the scenes in the Aiken County Public School District.
Her mission is to make sure students who are homeless have what they need so they can continue attending classes during their times of crisis.
Stroman gets them transportation, counseling and tutors. She also finds them clothing and school supplies.
In addition, Stroman assists the students’ parents and guardians with finding temporary and permanent places to stay. Often she refers them to various agencies that can help with their problems.
“It’s the best job in the worst circumstances,” Stroman told the Aiken Standard earlier this year in an article about homeless students.
Stroman is the School District’s lead student service worker and McKinney-Vento homeless liaison.
The latter title comes from the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, a federal law that protects the educational rights of students who don’t have a fixed regular or nighttime residence.
Stroman prefers using the word displaced to describe their plight because of the personal biases and negative perceptions associated with the term homeless.
During the 2016-17 school year, there were 521 displaced students locally “that we knew about,” Stroman said. In 2017-18, so far, there are approximately 300 being served by Stroman and the staff of seven that she supervises.
The latest group includes an 18-year-old special education student who lives in a shelter after being thrown out of his home, a first-grader who was staying in an Augusta hotel with his mother and a high school senior who is with her sister after depending on friends and others to take her in temporarily.
The 18-year-old special education student’s situation “weighs heavily on me,” Stroman said. “After I met him the first time, I went to my car, and I just cried and cried. I said, ‘Lord, you’ve got to help me because I don’t know what to do.’”
One of Stroman’s co-workers has stepped up, and the co-worker’s boyfriend, who is a barber, cuts the student’s hair. They buy him shoes, shirts and pants, and they do things with him like go to the fair.
“Now we are waiting on a placement for him so he won’t have to be in the shelter,” Stroman said. “We’re hoping for something like a residential group home.”
Stroman carries a cellphone that the School District provides her.
“When it rings, there is usually something wrong,” she said. “Nobody is calling to say, ‘I’m having a good day Mrs. Stroman, thank you very much.’ It’s ‘my lights have been cut off ‘ or ‘I’m about to be evicted’ or ‘I’m very, very depressed.’”
The career-related causes of frustration and stress for Stroman are numerous, but there also are sweet rewards.
“I just love helping people, but the changes don’t always come quickly and sometimes you just have to wade in there with them and hang in there,” she said. “I get satisfaction when they make progress – when a student makes it to the next grade level or a parent tells me, ‘We’ve rented a house, and we’re happy there.’”
But best of all, for Stroman, is seeing the students she has helped graduate from high school with their diplomas.
When Stroman attends their ceremonies, “I cry,” she said. “I go in the back where they are in their caps and gowns, and I hug them and I tell them how proud I am of them on their special day.”
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