Community Corner

Homecoming Grand Marshals Pioneered Girls Sports in District 202

Kathy Kazmar and Karen Roppa, both retired from teaching PE and coaching in Plainfield, will lead the Oct. 6 homecoming parade.

Kathy Kazmar doesn’t know if she and her fellow grand marshal, Karen Roppa, will don super hero costumes before they take their places of honor in Saturday’s homecoming parade.

But even if they don’t dress as caped crusaders, in keeping with this year’s community homecoming parade theme, the retired teachers and coaches are still heroes to the girls they mentored as they built the district’s girls interscholastic athletic program.

“These are two great ladies,” Plainfield High School Alumni Association President Jean Brannen said. The retired PE teachers were chosen to lead this year’s parade, which steps off at 9 a.m. Saturday, Oct. 6.

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Roppa, who pioneered the Plainfield High School softball program, spent her entire 35-year career in District 202, retiring in 2004.

Kazmar spearheaded the track program after being hired at PHS in 1972. She went on to become assistant athletic director in 1989 before retiring in 1998.

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Both women began careers in District 202 in the early 1970s — just as Title IX was passed. They soon began working for equal treatment for boys and girls athletics — but it wasn’t easy convincing school officials of the need for a girls athletic program in District 202.

“Title IX was coming out, and I made an appointment to see the superintendent,” Kazmar said. “To be honest with you, he laughed in my face and I walked out of there.”

But Kazmar and Roppa, joined by fellow District 202 PE teacher and Illinois State University graduate Kathy Cartwright, took their case to the PHS Athlete Booster Club and the athletic director at the time, Jim Hogan.

Hogan went to bat for the trio with the superintendent, who eventually agreed to allow them to begin a girls interscholastic athletics program, with Kazmar coaching girls track, while Roppa coached softball and Cartwright, then a teacher at Indian Trail Middle School, focusing on basketball and volleyball.

“For the first four years, we went without pay, we went without uniforms, we went without equipment,” Kazmar said.

They held bake sales and car washes to help purchase uniforms, and used good old ingenuity to make their own equipment.

“We made weights with concrete and sand,” Kazmar said.

They even had to teach themselves how to coach, Roppa added.

“We were the women at the right place and time,” she said. “We couldn’t wait to get started.”

Eventually, their perseverance paid off, and girls athletics became a District 202 fixture.

“After four years, the school district realized we were here to say, we weren’t giving up,” Kazmar said.

The grand marshals said all their hard work to make the girls sports program a reality was worth it.

“I had the opportunity to make sure every young lady in our district, when they go out for athletics, they have everything they need,” Kazmar said.

As for Roppa, she feels blessed.

“God blessed me with so many years with wonderful students and teachers,” she said. “The best part is, as I look back on the time, to be able to create something for someone that gave such joyous returns.”

Both women said they were surprised to learn they’d been named this year’s co-grand marshals.

 “It’s quite an honor,” said Roppa, who in her retirement is dividing her time between Florida and Decatur, Illinois, where she volunteers with a rescue dog shelter.

Roppa said she was in Florida when she got the call from PHS Principal Robert Smith.

“I get emotional [about it],” she said. “It was my entire life, and this is such an honor.”

Kazmar said she returned from vacation to learn the homecoming committee — of which she is a member — had voted in her absence to make her a grand marshal.

“It’s just going to be special,” she said.

’70s Reunion

This year’s 1970s reunion seems tailor-made for Kazmar and Roppa, whose careers began as the decade got under way.

“I’m trying to hit every reunion I can,” said Roppa, who added she’s thrilled to get to see some of her former students from her early years of teaching. “I had all those children.”

They’ll also get to see some of the former PHS athletes who helped build the girls sports program.

“Those kids were the ones who started it in the ’70s,” Kazmar said.

The former ISU classmates are also excited about reuniting.

 “I don’t get to see her very often,” Kazmar said of Roppa. “It’s going to be a great weekend.”

“I can’t wait,” Roppa added. “Rain or shine, I’ll be there.”

Keeping the parade going

Kazmar said the alumni association is looking for new volunteers to get involved in planning the annual homecoming parade — one of Plainfield’s biggest events.

Although three of District 202’s high schools — Plainfield North, Plainfield South and Plainfield East — celebrated their homecoming events the week of Sept. 24, the Oct. 6 parade is intended to be a communitywide event.

Each school is invited to be a part of the parade, which winds its way through downtown Plainfield.

“It’s kind of a special day in Plainfield,” said Kazmar, a longtime member of the association.

“This is the first [homecoming] I’m not going to work because I’m in the parade,” she said.

She urged community members to contact Brannen at ajar5@comcast.net to learn how they can get involved “to keep the parade going and keep it special for Plainfield.”

For more information on this year’s homecoming festivities, click here.


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