Irene Ryan
Contributing Writer
“My goal here is to form good relationships with the students so they know they can talk to me,” said Nurse Rachel Huertas about her first year as a school nurse.
Huertas previously worked as a trauma nurse at St. John’s Mercy Hospital. She dealt with motorcycle and car accidents, drunk driving and drug accidents, and one time the victim of a mobile meth lab explosion.
Huertas was offered a job at an elementary school but decided to work here because she really relates to highschoolers and thinks they are very interesting.
WGHS is also her alma mater, but students won’t see her class picture, Class of ’97, by the library. There were too many inappropriate gestures to Photoshop out, so they left it off the wall, Huertas said.
Huertas got her bachelor’s degree at UMSL in communication. She worked in TV and radio post production. Some of her clients included AT&T and McDonald’s. The advertising agencies would shoot the commercials, and she would put them together.
Her mother and aunt were both nurses, so she knew she would inevitably end up being one too, but she wanted to try something new first before that. She went to St. Louis Community College to get her degree in nursing.
She said nursing school is very disciplined, and students have to be motivated. “Being a nurse is definitely much easier that nursing school.”
Huertas has two children: a daughter at Steger and a two-and-a-half year old. Huertas also has a dog named Oscar Wilde.
She enjoys running and reading. She likes “Pride and Prejudice” and “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.”
She hopes to form good bonds with the students here and make them feel they can come to her with anything, she said.
