Mr. Church and Mrs. Lehr

NAME: Cynthia Lehr and Jeffery Church

YEARS MARRIED: 13 years

CHILDREN: 2

HOW MET: Former principal Dr. Paul Browning hired both of us to the same school (SHS), same department (English) the same year (2008). We met at the HCS new-teacher orientation, held at AAST, in August. That morning, before our first session started, I recognized from his nametag that he also was just hired to SHS. I tried to talk to him, but he spoke very little and the conversation died. We may have gone to different sessions that morning, but at lunch, he came and sat by me and we conversed in more depth.

WORKING RELATIONSHIP:

Mr. Church and Mrs. Lehr both teach English and often collaborate and perfect teaching strategies together. Their favorite things about working together are having the same vacation schedule and being able to support their children. 

“When we first started dating, we tried to keep the relationship to ourselves,” Mrs. Lehr said. “Unbeknownst to us, a colleague in our department had seen us together at Brookgreen’s Night of 1000 Candles.  Later in the spring, when we began to let others know, another colleague finally told us that everyone had known since we were spotted back in December. Busted!”

Mr. Church and Mrs. Lehr have different last names and don’t publicize their relationship. However, they used to have classrooms next to each other and ”one time, deep into the school year, a class of my students finally experienced the ‘Eureka!’ moment, and it was all I could do to keep a couple of them from storming next door to take a peek at ‘Ms. Lehr’s husband’!” Mrs. Lehr said.

They said an advantage to working together is that they’re on the same schedule, including their girls who get dropped off at Socastee after school. Also, “we can empathize with each other about professional woes and can advise each other as well,” Mrs. Lehr said.

Mr. Lehr said they bounce ideas off of each other.

“Since we teach the same subject, we collaborate and fine tune things off each other.”