As Pleasant Valley School District prepares to honor its hall of fame inductees next week, a petition is circulating to recognize a former Monroe County school nurse.

Every year the Pleasant Valley Hall of Fame honors individuals who have made a significant contribution to the school district.

This year makes a decade that the nomination for a nurse who served at the former Eldred Township Elementary School has been unsuccessful.

Now the community is stepping up to make sure the woman who saved a student’s life isn’t overlooked again. 

This petition is giving Jim McFadden hope. For the past 10 years he’s been trying to get his mom Millidene McFadden into the Pleasant Valley Hall of Fame only to receive a rejection letter. She served the school district as a school nurse practitioner for 21 years until she retired in 1995 at almost 71-years-old. After Millidene died, Jim started sending in the nomination form at the encouragement of others.

Jim says, "The students who have come to her for so many years had said to me, they think it would be a really great idea. She would see over 100 students in her health room every day, I mean literally documented."

Jim even got to meet the student that his mom saved with the heimlich maneuver in the 70’s, a technique that was just starting to gain public recognition at the time.

Jim says, "I had spoken to the administration of Pleasant Valley and one of the former administrators said it had been too long of a time and that nobody remembered anymore."

Former Student Andrea Deveraux remembers her visits to Millidene at the former Eldred Township Elementary School. And it was rarely for an illness.

Deveraux says, "She was the absolute sweetest person. Sometimes I’d even fake the funk to go down and visit her. I wasn’t even sick, but I just wanted to see her."

Deveraux is Jim’s hygienist at Quiet Valley Dental in Sciota and when she heard about the situation, she and fellow Hygienist Caitlin Gunnels knew they had to do something to help.

Gunnels says, "Touched me that he was writing these letters and I knew that there was a bit of an age gap between me and him, and I said you know there’s probably more we could do to get the word out and to get more eyes on this so I thought that we could maybe an online campaign with a petition so we could show the school district that a lot of people in the community still remember his mother."

In just two weeks, a little under 200 signatures have been posted with a lot of people sharing their fond memories just like Deveraux.

Deveraux says, "She was just always very comforting and always giving you a hug."

Jim says, "I am moved by the amount of support and the encouragement and the interest it’s generated."

Unfortunately, this year’s Hall of Fame inductees have already been chosen.But all of the ones not elected are reviewed for the next two years before a new nomination must be submitted. So there is still hope to persuade the board for next year.

Gunnels says, "You can find our petition and sign it. If you feel touched, you can try and write a letter or maybe call the district and see if you can put a good word in."

Pleasant Valley’s Director of Athletics sent us this statement in part:

“The committee meets in early December where they review and discuss each nomination.  That committee is made up of community members, past HOF members, district teachers, district administration, and myself and a school board representative.  Once the discussion is done a ballot is given to members and they cast their votes  anonymously. The votes are then tallied by the chairman and the top 5 most votes are selected for the current year Hall of Fame inductees.”

For more information about the impact Nurse McFadden made at Pleasant Valley, Just search for “Help Get Millidene McFadden into PV Hall of Fame” on Facebook.