When our community was invited to nominate favorite teachers for the upcoming Kids & Pets Issue, one theme stood out immediately: great teachers leave a lasting mark. Across New Braunfels classrooms, these educators are doing far more than teaching. They are building confidence, inspiring curiosity, and creating spaces where students feel seen, supported, and loved.
Samantha Harms is entering her 19th year in education and stepping into a new role as an Early Reading Interventionist at Oak Creek Elementary. After spending 14 years teaching first grade, she now helps young students build confidence as they learn one of life’s most important skills: reading.
Harms says her own childhood struggles with reading shaped the educator she became. Inspired by teachers who encouraged her when school felt difficult, she now carries that same approach into every student interaction. Reflecting on former first graders returning during their senior walk years later, she said those moments remind her why teaching matters. “You always made learning fun,” former students told her, a memory Harms says meant everything.
Sandie Claus has spent 16 years teaching kindergarten at Oak Creek Elementary, though she says she has known since childhood this was exactly what she was meant to do. Inspired by her own kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Flagg, Claus still remembers the handwritten letters and birthday cards that made her feel special long after leaving the classroom.
Today, she works to create that same sense of belonging for her own students. For Claus, kindergarten helps shape how children feel about learning for years to come. “If all I accomplish is making a child want to come to school each day and love learning, then I have done my job,” she shared. More than academics, she hopes students remember one thing most: that they were loved.
Jennifer Rompel recently retired after years of teaching fifth grade at Sts. Peter and Paul Catholic School, where she spent 12 years helping students grow both academically and personally. Before teaching, she worked in journalism before eventually feeling called back into education.
Rompel says one of the greatest joys of teaching came from the close-knit community she built with students and families over the years. Seeing former students return and hearing they still remembered her classroom fondly served as a reminder of how deeply teachers shape young lives. Looking back on her career, she says the heart of Catholic education was always clear. “The most important thing we do is help these kids grow into saints and teach them to pray.”
Kristin Clayton recently completed her 13th year of teaching after spending most of her career in second grade before moving into first grade this past school year. One highlight came when she watched former students graduate and realized just how quickly those years had passed.
Clayton originally studied advertising before volunteering in an elementary school and discovering she felt more connected helping students than completing class projects. One memory that still stays with her involved a student battling cancer whose classmates made sure he always felt included, even joining class virtually during treatment. That experience shaped how she approaches the classroom today. “Anyone can choose to be a good person,” Clayton said, a lesson she hopes every student carries with them.
Together, these educators represent the heart of New Braunfels schools, proving the lessons students remember most often have nothing to do with textbooks at all.