Katie Shamhart

There’s a common misconception that staying close to home means giving up on your dreams, as if dreams are always somewhere else. Somewhere bigger, faster; somewhere other than where you are.

But what if your dream is to pursue the career that’s the perfect fit for you, surrounded by a support system of family and friends, in a place that is comfortable and familiar to you? In other words, what if you wanted to live your dream, right at home? Is it possible? Katie Shamhart thinks so.

“I’ve definitely always been local, I’ve always been very dependent on the people around me,” she says. “I love the smalltown feel of everything, I love knowing everybody.” The smalltown atmosphere that Newton exudes makes it easy for Katie to get to know people in the community on more than a casual basis, and connect with others in a way that is more meaningful than a more urban area might allow. It has helped her develop a strong support system over the years, friends and family that encourage her and celebrate her achievements. Achievements such as being named one of NCHS’ five Illinois State Scholars this year.

“To me, it means that all of the hard work I’ve put into my academics is being recognized,” she says. And although she put forth a great deal of effort on the way to achieving the honor, she knows that she did not do it alone, and is especially pleased to have made her support group proud.

Becoming a State Scholar is starting to be something of a tradition in the Shamhart family. Katie’s older brother, who graduated last year, was one as well. She also has a younger brother, a freshman this year, that is well on his way to making it a trifecta. “All three of us, always, four-point-o,” she says of their grades.

Perhaps that’s inevitable, given that their parents are both teachers – Katie’s mom teaches fourth grade in Newton, and her dad is a high school math teacher in Charleston. And soon, there will be another educator in the family, because Katie is set on becoming a teacher, too.

She would like to think that even if her parents were not educators, she would have chosen the same career path, but acknowledges the strong influence that growing up the child of two teachers had on her. “Knowing the pros, and especially knowing the cons of going into teaching, it’s so much less stressful,” she relates. “It’s the career path, there’s no other one for me.”

Katie grew up seeing the reality of being an educator first hand – the weekend grading, dealing with sometimes difficult students and parents, and the stress of hectic schedules and tight deadlines balanced with having summers off, making real connections with students, enjoying a strong support system of colleagues, and the stability and familiarity of the school environment. “Knowing everything about it, that is definitely helping make my career choice,” she says.

Growing up, she always considered herself to be more of a math person, due to the fact that her dad was a math teacher. But the more that she was exposed to the humanities in school, the more they appealed to her – particularly English. “Although math is the principles – you know it’s a set answer – I really like the fact that English is just everything, all together,” she says.

And so, despite having a transcript heavy with math courses (algebra 1, 2 and 3, trigonometry, calculus and statistics), Katie will enter college next year as an English major. “I want to major in English Education,” she shares. She is already enrolled at Eastern Illinois University, because although she has earned grades that will get her into almost any institution of higher learning in the country, Katie knows she doesn’t have to wander far away to catch her dream. It’s right here, close to home.

College life brings new experiences, responsibilities and priorities, making it easy sometimes to leave your pre-college life behind. But Katie will always remember her time at NCHS fondly, “Especially the class of ‘24,” she says. “With COVID and everything happening, and especially with the St. Thomas group coming in and sports being intertwined, we all knew each other very well anyway. Being able to bond over that experience, and being able to help each other through that – I’ve seen how everyone’s changed.”

She appreciates the closeness and camaraderie that her class enjoyed, and realizes that it is perhaps unique to the kind of close-knit small town that Newton is. “I remember, here is where I talked to this person every single day. Even though we weren’t friends, we weren’t in the same friend group, we were still friends in this classroom,” she recalls. “Every single senior is like that – you can put two random ones in a room together, and they will tell you about a million stories about experiences they’ve had together.”

No doubt, Newton is a special place that exerts a strong influence on its young citizens. But just as a community plays a big part in shaping its youth into the people they are to become, so too do the people that inhabit a community shape that place into a supportive, nurturing environment that keeps people wanting to stay close to it. People like Katie Shamhart, who chased and caught her dream here, and who will be around for a long time to come, helping others to do the same.