Kathy Steinhoff conquers challenges as she pursues her goals of being a voice and an advocate for others and their issues.
“At the time, I felt like I was hitting a brick wall on so many occasions,” Steinhoff said.
It all started in St. Louis, Missouri, Steinhoff’s hometown. Ever since she was a little girl, Steinhoff wanted to be a teacher under her aunt’s influence.
“She was really the only woman in my life who had a job. My mom didn’t work, and I had other aunts and women in my neighborhood that I knew, but all of them stayed at home with their kids. She was my first exposure to a job,” Steinhoff said.
As a child, she would play teacher with her friends and siblings.
“My sister used to make fun of me all the time because when she was out running around the neighborhood, I was always taking my pretend class on field trips, and I would embarrass her with the neighborhood friends,” Steinhoff said.
With the mindset of becoming a teacher as she got older, Steinhoff obtained a bachelor’s degree in math education and a master’s degree in curriculum and instruction at the University of Missouri. From there, she taught with Columbia Public Schools for the next 34 years.
During her time at Hickman, Stienhoff developed valuable relationships, and her peers looked up to her.
“She was so innovative while also so helpful to me as a new teacher. I would strive every day to ‘keep up’ with her. I learned so much from her. It didn’t matter how long she had taught, she was always willing to try a new activity or a new strategy,” Emily Augustine, a staff member at Hickman High School, said.
Steinhoff was also a part of an advocacy group called CMNEA that promoted and protected public education and supported staff and faculty so they could provide different learning opportunities for all students.
“I decided to go to one of their meetings, and it was very different for me because up to that time, all of the meetings that I ever went to had to do with school was talking about what was going on in our classroom, and this meeting was different because we were talking about what issues teachers in their lives that really was impacted by the fact that we were teachers,” Steinhoff said.
Steinhoff didn’t discover this group herself. One of her colleagues, a teacher at Paxton Keeley Elementary School, Monica Miller, was the president of CMNEA at the time, and convinced her to join. Miller was surprised by her willingness to be as involved as she was.
“The next meeting, there she was. [Steinhoff] said, ‘Be involved, be active, I’m ready to be a part of the solution.’ And it’s been like that with her ever since. She was ready to step out. She was ready to come off the role of just being a name on a piece of paper, and [start] being an activist,” Miller said.
As Steinoff continued her journey with CMNEA, she began to help advocate for other faculty and staff members.
“I was a part of the process where we started bargaining in Columbia Public Schools, and by the time I left, we had a multi-page contract about rights that teachers have in the district and will have potentially forever,” Steinhoff said.
After 34 years of teaching and advocating, Steinhoff was introduced to the idea of running for the House of Representatives. At first, though, she wasn’t 100% sure of that idea.
“I really didn’t know that much about the government, so the idea of being a legislator did seem really foreign to me, but the idea of advocating for people had become my second nature just because I had been president for CMNEA for so long,” Steinhoff said.
In January of that same year, it was required by law to redraw the boundaries of who could run in which city, and it turns out that the only opponent when she was running for her seat was outside of the boundaries, so the idea was still being entertained.
“Then I slowly kept talking to people that I really trust, hoping somebody would talk me out of it, and I just got a lot of support from all of these different people, and I knew by the next week, this is what I wanted to do. Their predictions were right. We hit social media really hard, and I didn’t end up having an opponent,” Steinhoff said.
From then on, Steinhoff overcame many odds and is now working as a Representative at the Capitol in Jefferson City.
“It is really cool to have this experience. I mean, just walking in that Capitol every day, I have my own office, I have my own assistant, I have somebody who checks my emails and puts things on a calendar for me,” Steinhoff said.
Being in the House of Representatives may sound fun, but it can get challenging for some individuals, especially when you are working with others who may not see eye to eye.
“It is hard to be in that super minority. If you have any good ideas, it’s really only going to go through Republicans, because they are credited for it. Trying to find a way to make a place for yourself, being effective down there is a challenge,” Steinhoof said.
Even though a lot of challenges come with her job, Steinhoff won’t stop until her ideals and goals are achieved.
“My biggest thing is to advocate, protect, and promote public schools and educators as much as I can. It’s going to be hard for me to get my own ideas through, but I can also try to defend [against] some of the bad things that are coming our way, and just try to be a voice of reason to people that are willing to listen and understand these situations,” Steinhoff said.
