Episode 59: Custodian Appreciation Day with Jeanne Pratt

October 4th, 2024 /
Alexander Glaves /

Sup with the Sup

00:00 / 15:20

Welcome everyone to the next episode of Provo City School District’s What’s Up With The Sup’ podcast. I am Superintendent Wendy Dau, and we have a special episode this week. Wednesday, October 2nd was designated as National Custodian Appreciation Day. In recognition of that day, I spent some time with one of our amazing custodians, Jeanne Pratt, at Wasatch Elementary School.

We talked about what her job is like on a day-to-day basis, and I shadowed her as she took care of Wasatch.

But first, we can’t forget our updates.

Beginning Monday, October 7th, the district and all schools will be able to send Text messages.
- In preparation for that, parents will receive a text message from our provider, School Messenger.
- They will send an initial text message to let you know that the text messaging service will be active. The message, however, will not be able to specify that it is from Provo City School District.
- So please note that when you receive this initial message, it is from Provo City School District and you do not need to opt out of the messages.
The Utah State Board of Education Child Nutrition Programs and Utah Food Bank have announced a new criteria for determining eligibility for the Emergency Food Assistance Program, and it is a federal program that helps supplement the diets of low-income Americans by providing them with emergency food assistance at no cost. Income Eligibility Guidelines are effective from July 1st through June 30th every year, and automatic eligibility is given to individuals who currently participate in one of the following programs:
- - SNAP, which stands for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program
  - Medicaid
  - Free or reduced price school meal benefits, so if your child is on free or reduced lunch, you would automatically qualify
  - Or if you have a child that’s enrolled in the federal Head Start program, you also qualify.
- Please check our district website for more information and for where you can obtain this emergency food assistance.
The next school board meeting will be a study session and business meeting on Tuesday, October 8th.
- The study session will begin at 5 o’clock p.m. in boardroom one, and the business meeting will begin at 7 o’clock p.m. in the Professional Development Center.
- Public input can be shared in the business meeting.
Continue watching for my weekly videocasts in your email every Monday morning.
- These videocasts provide one place for you to learn about important things happening across the district.

And now, let’s talk with Jeanne Pratt, our head custodian at Wasatch Elementary.

Wendy Dau: So you’ve been the head custodian here at Wasatch Elementary for 10 years, but how long have you been at Wasatch?

Jeanne Pratt: I’ve been here for 30.

Wendy Dau: Okay, good.

Jeanne Pratt: And I started out as a teacher’s aide.

Wendy Dau: Okay.

Jeanne Pratt: And then the custodian needed help, so I shadowed him, and that’s the only reason why I got to be, became the head custodian, because I was able to apply for it after learning-

Wendy Dau: Oh, cool.

Jeanne Pratt: And following him. Yeah, I did P.E. I taught P.E. and read kids. But this was really a blessing to me to get a full time job and have people trust me.

Wendy Dau: What are all of the different things that comprise of your day in a given week? Because it’s a lot of different things and you just have to go where the crisis is, I’m sure. But-

Jeanne Pratt: It’s whatever’s needed every day and there’s a schedule. We follow the schedule. I have a really good team. members. I’ve always had good team members. Two of them are ladies that help me in the morning.

Wendy Dau: Okay.

Jeanne Pratt: And so they help with assemblies, with tidiness, with disinfectant, things like that. Anything outside, they help me with. Then, in the afternoon, I obviously have some teenagers and a couple of young adults that work at night and they’re called sweepers or assistant.

Wendy Dau: That’s great.

Jeanne Pratt: I’ve had such great support from the district all these years like Kyle recently the last month or two of school, last year.

Wendy Dau: Uh huh.

Jeanne Pratt: When we knew we were going to move.

Wendy Dau: Yeah.

Jeanne Pratt: He scheduled with me every Friday to come and dump all of our garbage. I had Kyle and Jeff Hawkins. Um, they’re always behind me and got my back.

And that’s helped me last year a lot longer because I’ve had good support there.

Wendy Dau: People have like an attachment to this building. It’s going to be really hard for, I mean, people are excited about getting to a new facility.

Jeanne Pratt: Yeah.

Wendy Dau: But there’s just sentimentality. So tell me a little bit about that.

Jeanne Pratt: There’s sentimentality. And I’ve been here so long, I’ve had teachers come and go that I knew real well. And there’s just good memories, you know. And I’ve always been treated nice. Always.

Wendy Dau: Good.

Jeanne Pratt: Been treated nice. And if you looked at my, by my computer today, in the work room, that’s where I have my office. I have an office, but I like to sit where people can find me.

Wendy Dau: Yeah. Oh, well that speaks volumes.

Jeanne Pratt: I had all kinds of goodies and stuff.

Wendy Dau: Oh good. So people taking good care of you.

Jeanne Pratt: They took really good care of me.

Wendy Dau: Okay, good. Made you feel really special.

Jeanne Pratt: But I do have really good memories here, you know.

Wendy Dau: What’s been one of the, like, biggest challenges of being a head custodian, especially of an older building?

Jeanne Pratt: Well, I really don’t think I have challenges because we have had a lot of repairs.

Wendy Dau: Okay.

Jeanne Pratt: Our roof leaks a lot.

Wendy Dau: That’s kind of what happens, yeah?

Jeanne Pratt: But going back to the district, all I have to do is put a work order in and those gentlemen, ladies are here and they take care of that stuff because they always know I’ve got leaks

Wendy Dau: Yeah.

Jeanne Pratt: You know and and they ask if I don’t

Wendy Dau: Like, are you sure you’re okay?

Jeanne Pratt: Do you have any leaks, you know? So, I mean, I really, I don’t really have concerns, because I have good support. And honestly, I’ve worked under six principals since I’ve been here that long. And their administration, they’ve always supported me.

Wendy Dau: Good. Well, we tell principals that they need to be supporting their custodial staff because that’s the only way we get a welcoming and wonderful environment, right?

Jeanne Pratt: Exactly. Exactly.

Wendy Dau: Like we need you so much and we need to work together as a team.

Jeanne Pratt: Exactly.

Wendy Dau: Is there a funny story or the grossest thing you’ve cleaned up that might be appropriate for a podcast?

Jeanne Pratt: I might not share that one.

Wendy Dau: Okay, don’t. All right, but let’s just put it on over here.

Jeanne Pratt: I can go close to that.

Wendy Dau: Okay, that sounds great.

Jeanne Pratt: Years ago, the little kids talking in class about the weather, I remember on the news, I saw in the news that it was only going to snow on the Wasatch Front. And I go to school the next day and this darling little girl comes up. She goes, Mrs. Pratt, Mrs. Pratt. Cause she had seen a shoveling.

She goes, it’s only going to snow on the front of Wasatch. And I just, at least she watched the news too. I thought that was so cute.

Wendy Dau: That’s so cute.

Jeanne Pratt: And I won’t share the bad sickness. Yeah, but I’ve had several children telling me I’m so sorry after they’ve gotten sick and I thought it’s because I love them. It doesn’t bother me. It doesn’t bother me how bad it is because I love them. I couldn’t do that at Walmart. If I had to clean up after a stranger at Walmart, I probably would get sick. I care about the kids and I know who they are and it doesn’t upset me, you know, so.

Wendy Dau: Just as we were even walking down the hall, just the kids that give you hugs and say hello to you, it’s clear you build really great relationships with kids and that you really love them and care about them.

Jeanne Pratt: 99 percent of them make it worth, make it worth coming to work every day.

Wendy Dau: Amen. Amen to that. Tell me what some of your concerns or stresses might be about moving to a new building and what can we do as a district to make sure you’re getting the health and support that you need because this is a big undertaking.

Jeanne Pratt: It is a big undertaking. Well, first of all, because Kyle has helped us get stuff moved and his teams, the grounds people and the maintenance people, they came last Friday. And took another big huge load that we rounded up.

Wendy Dau: Oh, good. Okay, good.

Jeanne Pratt: And so, I don’t feel stressful there. New Principal and Mary and Lauren.

Wendy Dau: Uh huh.

Jeanne Pratt: Both support us with getting the teachers to look at their stuff, go through it, get rid of what they can and they have been. If they hadn’t supported me that way and I had to worry about more stuff in everybody’s room.

Wendy Dau: Yeah.

Jeanne Pratt: That would be a problem. Yeah. But, but the teacher’s been saying, can you give me some boxes? I’m going to take something home. Or if I want to throw something out. What do I do? I just put it in the hall. We’ll come by, grab it, and we’ll throw it away.

Wendy Dau: Oh, that’s great.

Jeanne Pratt: So that part has worked really, really good. I could actually show you where they’ve cleaned out basements.

Wendy Dau: Oh, good.

Jeanne Pratt: The district.

Wendy Dau: Yeah.

Jeanne Pratt: It’s just empty, you know. It just, I mean, and we would have had to worry about that.

Wendy Dau: Okay, good.

Jeanne Pratt: Without the district’s help.

Wendy Dau: Okay.

Jeanne Pratt: And without a principal behind us.

Wendy Dau: Kind of helping you.

Jeanne Pratt: When, when we found out we were getting Ruthann Snow and Mary and Lauren, they introduced them to us in here. And I remember Mary saying, I’m, I’m good at moving.

And I’m going-

Wendy Dau: Yeah, she is good at moving.

Jeanne Pratt: She’s got my heart already. That made me relax. And she has, she’s backed us up. All of them have. So…

Wendy Dau: That’s awesome. I think there’s also a lot to going into new building. We were over there on a tour and they were showing us, I think just the air handlers and that just gave me anxiety.

Like to just think about like, yes, like there’s a lot of equipment and things that you’re learning and-

Jeanne Pratt: And that is a concern of mine. And I told Jeff at recently and Kyle that if I feel like I can’t run fast enough, because that does scare me a little bit up there, I we’re kind of moving in the middle of the year. So I’m for sure hanging in here for the move.

Wendy Dau: Right.

Jeanne Pratt: But I’m going to be honest if I get up to that point where it’s too much and I can’t get, I need to get a little extra help.

Wendy Dau: Yeah. No question.

Jeanne Pratt: Because there’s more bathrooms through there.

Wendy Dau: Oh, there is. There is definitely more bathrooms.

Jeanne Pratt: So I need a bathroom specialist.

Wendy Dau: Yeah.

Jeanne Pratt: Because that’s been me here. Yeah. Yeah.

Wendy Dau: We have to, we have to consider that layout.

Jeanne Pratt: I’m not going to let anything hang.

Wendy Dau: Well, you make sure that you communicate that so that we are being supportive because we want to make sure that you’re still feeling as upbeat about your job.

Jeanne Pratt: I’m afraid to tell the teachers when I get stressed out about it because I don’t want them to be.

Wendy Dau: Right. Right. And so sometimes we’re like-

Jeanne Pratt: Okay, we’re okay.

Wendy Dau: We’re okay. It’s fine.

Jeanne Pratt: And some of my seasoned teachers. I was really worried about them because they’ve got so much stuff and they’ve just been marvelous. They’ve, one of them, I keep telling her, I said, I’m just so proud of you.

Wendy Dau: Yeah.

Jeanne Pratt: Because she’s constantly getting rid of more stuff.

Wendy Dau: Yeah.

Jeanne Pratt: And making sure it’s down to what she really needs to move. And that’s what Ruthann’s asked us to do, is to, we’re just taking what we need. To, to teach and move.

Wendy Dau: Well, and we’ve got so much, so much of what we have now as we teach is digitized, right?

So that makes things a lot easier, right? So that’s a little bit better. Yeah, they’re kind of going away. Yay!

Jeanne Pratt: We had like 40 to 50 filing cabinets that they took away for me.

Wendy Dau: I just want you to know how much we appreciate what you do. We know that your job is really tough some days and I can tell it does, but I hope it also brings you a lot of joy and I’m just so grateful you’re in Provo District.

Jeanne Pratt: Thank you and we feel your support. We do. Even before today, we felt it.

Wendy Dau: Okay, great. Thank you so much. Thanks so much for doing this. That’s so sweet.

Jeanne Pratt: I thought you were so cute helping me.

Wendy Dau: That’s awesome. No, that was awesome. I love it.

Jeanne Pratt: You’re just working hard with me?

Wendy Dau: I’m just going to work hard with you, and, and I just want to ask you a bunch of questions just so that people get to know what it is that you do all day.

Jeanne Pratt: Okay.

Wendy Dau: Because people have perceptions about things.

Jeanne Pratt: They do.

Wendy Dau: And they don’t realize that you’re probably doing way more than your job description, right?

Jeanne Pratt: You know what, I’ve lasted here so long because they treat me nicely.

Wendy Dau: Good. We’re getting sticky fingers that they threw up on the ceiling.

Jeanne Pratt: Oh, yeah, that’s fun. Oh, here we go. Our first sticky thing. Our cute secretary said, maybe I’ll quit ordering those as rewards. Because they like to throw them up there.

Wendy Dau: They do, don’t they?

Jeanne Pratt: And then the kids go, Mrs. Pratt, can you get it down? Oh, yeah. And I say, yes.

Wendy Dau: Yes.

Jeanne Pratt: But when I get it down, I’m throwing it away.

Wendy Dau: The good news is I’m pretty tall.

Jeanne Pratt: Yay. Awesome.

Wendy Dau: There we go.

Jeanne Pratt: I think we’re good.

Wendy Dau: Okay.

Jeanne Pratt: I think that’s something else.

Wendy Dau: So how long have you been the Head Custodian?

Jeanne Pratt: I’ve been about ten years.

Wendy Dau: Look at how happy and positive you are still after ten years. That’s amazing.

Jeanne Pratt: You know why? They treat me nice here.

Wendy Dau: Because that’s why.

Jeanne Pratt: And that’s why. I couldn’t do this anywhere else.

Wendy Dau: No. But that’s also-

Jeanne Pratt: Teachers treat me with respect.

Wendy Dau: But it’s also because you have a really good attitude about everybody. Like I can just see in your, your demeanor. Well, no, I can just see in your demeanor. You’re just helpful and you-

Jeanne Pratt: Well, I love it. I couldn’t do this anywhere else.

Wendy Dau: Let’s go.

Jeanne Pratt: Let’s set up for breakfast.

Wendy Dau: Let’s go. Okay. I love it.

Jeanne Pratt: Okay. These tables are the only ones we use for breakfast. So I’m going to pull this one way out.

Wendy Dau: Okay.

Jeanne Pratt: And I guess we’re getting new tables with the new school.

Wendy Dau: Yes, you are. Kind of staggered?

Jeanne Pratt: Yeah. Strategically placed is what I said.

Wendy Dau: Strategically placed.

Jeanne Pratt: Because if you don’t, the kids hit each other with their trays and we lose trays.

Wendy Dau: See, you already know all these things.

Jeanne Pratt: You good? Yay! Thank you.

Wendy Dau: That’s awesome.

Jeanne Pratt: We’re done for breakfast. I have a fix it job.

Wendy Dau: Oh, let’s do it.

Jeanne Pratt: You want to do that? Okay, let’s go.

Wendy Dau: Yes!

Jeanne Pratt: We got aerators. I don’t know how we get these little black pebbles in our aerators on the faucets, but it’s a constant changing these. Okay, we’re gonna change the aerators.

Wendy Dau: Okay.

Jeanne Pratt: And it’s lefty loosey, righty tighty. Yep.

Wendy Dau: Oh yeah.

Jeanne Pratt: There you go.

Wendy Dau: Your other left, Wendy. Oh my gosh, I don’t think I’m grabbing-

Jeanne Pratt: It might not have grabbed it.

Wendy Dau: Oh, I can see it. It is moving.

Jeanne Pratt: You got it? Yeah.

Wendy Dau: I don’t know.

Jeanne Pratt: Yep, you got it.

Wendy Dau: Oh, yes!

Jeanne Pratt: So we just untwist it.

Wendy Dau: Okay.

Jeanne Pratt: And what’s really funny is the little kids will tell me, you need an aerator on the, I mean, they either work with mom or dad on these things.

Wendy Dau: That’s funny. They’re like, you need a new aerator.

Jeanne Pratt: They know the word aerator. I’m going, okay.

Wendy Dau: That’s funny.

Jeanne Pratt: And they also know how to turn it off underneath.

Wendy Dau: Oh, I’m sure they do. I’m sure you’ve got to check that. There we go.

Jeanne Pratt: Oh, you got it.

Wendy Dau: Yes.

Jeanne Pratt: And once you’ve got it on tight enough. You can do maybe one or two righty tighties.

Wendy Dau: She’s never going to let us do this ever again.

Jeanne Pratt: Yes, I will. I think it’s awesome.

Wendy Dau: Alright, you better test it out and make sure I did it right.

Jeanne Pratt: Perfect. Thank you.

Wendy Dau: No, thank you for doing this.

Jeanne Pratt: That was fun.

Wendy Dau: That was awesome.

Jeanne Pratt: Climbing ladders and fixing aerators. Pretty, pretty awesome.

Wendy Dau: Thank you everyone for joining me for this week’s episode of What’s Up with the Sup’.

As always, all episodes will be posted on the district website, YouTube, and anywhere you get your podcasts. If you have any topics or questions you would like us to discuss on the podcast, please email us at podcast@provo.edu. We will be back again next week with an all new episode of What’s Up with the Sup’.

Have a great weekend.