TONGANOXIE, Kan. — It was a crowded funeral, as friends and family said goodbye to a beloved teacher. 52-year-old Ronda Andrews gave her life to teaching kids and sharing her faith with others. Wednesday, nearly 600 of her friends turned out to sing the praises of the second-grade teacher who was valued by the small community.
“She was Jesus walking on the earth,” family friend Kathleen Smith said. “She wanted to help everyone. Her goal in life was to make sure she saw everyone in heaven.”
Ronda used her position as teacher at Genesis Christian Academy in Tonganoxie to raise donation money for mission work. She helped generate donations for mission work in Russia and Haiti.
“Ronda was a dynamo,” family friend Dan Stoll said. “No matter what she did it was full-boar. She had that sparkle in her eye and that smile — sometimes, a wry smile. You never knew what she was up to.”
Ronda’s life ended Friday in Leavenworth County in an accident on State Avenue at 158th Street in Basehor, Kan. It’s a tricky intersection where it’s sometimes tough to see oncoming cars. She’s the second member of her church congregation to die in the same spot during a five-year period.
Related: Intersection Where Teacher Died Will Get Stoplight
“I’ve seen other intersections closed that have had fewer accidents,” family friend Tim Smith said. “This one remains open. All we can do is hope the light will result in fewer tragedies.”
The Kansas Department of Transportation plans to install a traffic signal at the intersection, but work on that isn’t scheduled to begin until late August.
“It’s late. Two people have been lost,” Tim Smith said. “We’ve been affected by that. We just do what we can in life. We never know when that moment comes, when God calls us home, and Ronda was ready.”
